[Anniversary] Seniors First BC celebrates 32 years

As Seniors First BC marks 32 years since its incorporation as a non-profit society, this is an opportunity to reflect on our history and enduring commitment to promote the dignity of older adults in British Columbia. As we have also entered National Volunteer Week, we should recognize and celebrate the volunteers whose dedication have helped shape and sustain our work.

Much of the early recognition about seniors’ legal issues was documented by Senior Citizen Counsellors. These retired people volunteered with a program which, at that time, was managed by the provincial Ministry of Human Resources. They went into people’s homes in communities around the province, helping to make applications for benefits and complete income tax returns to prove eligibility for much needed financial and housing help. In doing this work they often learned about more serious problems like financial, physical and sexual abuse.

In the 1980s some of these Senior Citizen volunteers were working with Pearl McKenzie, a legal information counsellor at North Shore Community Services. Together, they set out to learn more about the legal issues and identify ways to protect the rights of old persons, eventually sharing information around the province through meetings and a newsletter called the “Shared Concern”. Pearl McKenzie created a manual called “Legal Issues in Elder Abuse Intervention”.

The first Elder Abuse Conference, was organized in 1985 by the BC Association of Social Workers. Linda Tod was largely responsible for this initiative and later became one of the volunteer founders of our organization. Following the conference, representatives of the various groups – people doing the community legal work on the North Shore, social and health care workers and government – came together out of concern for the wellbeing of vulnerable seniors and formed the committee with the Social Planning and Research Council (SPARC), which began publishing bulletins on elder abuse prevention and resource lists.

SPARC partnered with Douglas College and the BC Old Age Pensioner’s organization to create “sound definitions around elder abuse”, prepare toolkits and organize information-sharing events. In 1991, the Justice Institute of BC, working with the North Shore group, hosted a conference titled “Elder Abuse: A Shared Problem”, which brought together people from around the province to focus on coordinating services to help seniors experiencing abuse. 

Members of the SPARC grouped collaborated with North Shore Community Services (now North Shore Community Resources), on creating elder abuse prevention response and training in eight communities: Powell River, Kamloops, Peace River, Langley, Vancouver, Vernon and Sto:Lo Tribal Council. The work of these communities informed the development of community response networks under the Adult Guardianship legislation, which later led to the creation of the BC Association of Community Response Networks, one of our longest standing partners, which currently has 95 Community Response Networks in BC (and counting)!

By 1994, representatives from those eight communities and members of the BC Coalition on the Prevention of Elder Abuse and Neglect joined together and incorporated the BC Coalition to Eliminate Abuse of Seniors (BC CEAS), which later turned into Seniors First BC.

Read the full newsletter here