Developing an action plan

Once you have completed your analysis and established priorities for action, this guide can direct you through the task of creating an AFC action plan.

The action plan should be a stand-alone document that can supplement existing policies that may be included in other local plans (for example, the BC Union of Municipalities’ report: Planning for the future: Age-friendly and Disability-friendly Official Community Plans. Your action plan should:

• Link your vision to practical strategies: Carry the momentum you have developed and turn it into recognizable progress.
• Be realistic: Write your plan to be complementary and compatible with key local decision-making processes, rather than expecting these processes to adapt to the needs of the plan.
• Group content: Order your strategic actions using the AFC dimensions you used in your community evaluation. Using these eight dimensions to structure your action plan ensures that a comprehensive set of strategies is developed and offers continuity to the process.

Objectives

• Lay out specific actions that address the key gaps in your community’s p-e fit

Key skills

• Data analysis/mapping
• Project management
• Communications/presentation
• Team building/networking
• Report writing

Key tasks

• Analyze your needs assessment data
• Identify specific strategies that address the gaps identified by
• your needs assessment
• Compile strategies into an
• action plan with specific goals
• and objectives

The key to creating a successful action plan is to think ahead to the eventual implementation of the plan (see Strategic Actions section below). Having access to someone who is experienced with action planning would be an asset, but the most important resource at your disposal at this point is the experience and connections your steering committee has developed. Keep the following in mind:

• Having your municipal council officially adopt your action plan will increase the likelihood that key strategies will receive continued attention from the community.
• Implementing many strategic actions (for example, improving older adults’ access to transit) requires involving specific municipal departments, service providers and community organizations. Involving these stakeholders in developing the plan generates their commitment and puts the proposals of your action plan on a practical and feasible grounding. Your municipality could integrate elements of the action plan into other key municipal plans, such as official plans, secondary plans, housing strategies, transportation and transit master plans, urban design guidelines and street designs.
• Involve stakeholders (well-known local members of the business community and other community leaders) in the action planning process. Rallying support in the community means your age-friendly resolutions will have more support when you place them before city/town council.
• Prepare for the council vote. Schedule a deputation — a presentation — to council, focusing on the benefits of age-friendliness to the community as a whole.

Action Plan Elements

The foundation for your action plan ought to be the guiding principles and vision statement you developed during the Defining Local Principles phase of your initiative (Section 4). Using this vision statement, translate conceptual ideas into practical action:

• Define the look, feel and function of key elements in your community if it were the ideal place for older adults to live.
• Connect your action plan’s guiding principles to measurable, concrete AFC objectives.
• Frame issues in a way that allows you to monitor the progress in your community once the plan is implemented.
• Directly relate to one of the key elements described in your vision statement.
• Focus on discussing the issues in a single AFC dimension, and link related issues from several dimensions.
• Emphasize implementation by ensuring that any action is proposed and presented in a measurable form using quantitative or qualitative measurements of progress.

To ensure that readers of your action plan can easily interpret the overall message in the context of the local community, provide an age-friendly community profile (Section 4: Create an Age-Friendly Community Profile) in your action plan. In this version of the AFC profile, you may want to outline some of the key developments that have occurred since your initiative started.

The following elements describe the most common pieces of information included in a community profile about existing action plans:

• The Past: What has the community done to support the needs of older adults?
• The Present: How age-friendly is the community?
• The Future: Where will it be demographically in the future?

The Past

Describing what a community has accomplished is an important element for a complete action plan (such as planning initiatives, policy developments, research reports, community milestones).Your action plan should discuss:

• Key community partnerships and individual champions that carried the initiative;
• Primary research sources for creating the action plan and related funding;
• Any key secondary data sources that the action plan was based on;
• The processes you followed to conduct focus groups and the community-wide needs assessment, including the sampling approach that you used;
• An overview of the sample you obtained during focus groups and the needs assessment;
• Key limitations to the methods that you used.

The planning process section in Brantford’s Master Aging Plan offers a detailed example of how you might organize and present a community’s historical aging profile.

Link relevant community statistics with focus-group statements from older adults. Interviews could also supplement this testimonial information. The goal is to illustrate a routine day for an older adult in the community, highlighting aspects that bring enjoyment to his or her life and those that might be a barrier to independence. A socio-demographic cross-section of the community should supplement this individual testimony. A profile should measure older adults’ living arrangements, health, income, ethnicity and culture in addition to the obvious measures of age and gender. See chapter eight of Hodge’s The Geography of Aging: Preparing Communities for the Surge in Seniors.^{footnote 16[16]}

A good community profile will include an overview of the current community environment, with a focus on describing the physical and social environments and programs and services that are essential to the daily lives of older adults. To communicate this information clearly and to explore the geographic distribution of these aspects within your community, you may want to map statistical indicators at a neighbourhood scale (for example, census tracts).

Cockburn, Australia’s Age-Friendly Strategic Plan and Mississauga’s Older Adult Plan include profiles of existing “Older Adult Programs, Services, and Facilities.” The Mississauga example introduces the concept of an “older adult cluster: a concentration of senior-oriented facilities and services in a limited geographical area that is accessible by car and transit and within which walking is feasible” (http://www.mississauga.ca/file/COM/Old_Adult_Report_1.pdf).

The Future

The goal of your plan is to produce not only short-term, but also long-term strategies to enhance older adults’ quality of life (QoL). Ideally, you would include the factors described above in a socio-demographic projection of your community. Unfortunately, accurate projections for all of these indicators may not be readily available for all communities (for example, living arrangements), may be impractical to create in others (for example, health) and could be expensive to obtain in many cases. Still, understanding the future demographics in your community is vital to creating a proactive plan. Projections should include likely age, gender, income and ethnicity distributions at five-year, 10-year and 20-year horizons.

Southwestern Ontario

London’s Age-friendly Community Experience

Staying on Track with the Support of a Global Network

What has London done?

In 2012, City Council approved a Three Year Action Plan for an Age-Friendly London. More than 500 residents were consulted in the creation of the Plan. Implementation began in 2013, and improvements already made include the installation of countdown timers on crosswalks, improved readability of street signs (starting with those at major intersections), and the advertisement of the London Transit Commission’s “Get On Board” program - which provides education on how to use the city’s bus system - to seniors’ groups.

How did London get there?

2010: London became the first Canadian municipality to join the World Health Organization’s Global Network of Age-Friendly Cities and Communities

2012: Representatives of the Task Force presented the Action Plan to London City Council, where it was unanimously endorsed 2013: The Age-Friendly London Network was established to implement the Action Plan

2011: London City Council created the Age-Friendly London Task Force

The Task Force reviewed demographics and existing services, developed a vision and strategies, and underwent extensive consultations with organizations and individuals in the community. This nine month process ultimately led to the creation of a Three Year Action Plan to achieve an Age-Friendly London

What are London’s next steps?

London will continue with its implementation of the Three Year Action Plan, improving quality of life for the city’s residents. There are many more improvements planned, including the creation of a “check-in” service for isolated seniors and the development of a recognition program for older adult volunteers. As a member of the WHO Global Network of Age-Friendly Cities and Communities, London is committed to undertaking a process of continually assessing and improving the age friendliness of the community and ensuring that older adults are involved throughout the process in a meaningful way.

To learn from other community experiences, visit http://healthy.uwaterloo.ca/~afc/community_stories.html

Southwestern Ontario

Cambridge’s Age-friendly Community Experience

Engaging the Community to Develop a Customized Plan

What has Cambridge done?

A survey conducted in Cambridge found that residents appreciated the existing easy-to-read signage, available outdoor parks and spaces, plenty of volunteer opportunities and general show of respect for older adults. Cambridge has worked together with its older adults and service providers to assess the needs of the community and put forth 5 key areas for community improvement as seen below:

• Housing − Particularly affordable, accessible options where individuals feel safe and have the supports to successfully age in place
• Transportation − Improving public transportation so that car access or ability to drive are not a barrier to maintaining a high quality of life
• Community Health Services and Support − Access to quality health care and home supports to enable active aging and aging in place
• Respect and Social Inclusion – All residents should be able to participate fully in society, without facing barriers due to age
• Communication and Information − Information should be readily accessible in a variety of ways, it should “come into the hands” of older adults.

The needs were discussed through forums and focus groups to create the foundation of the Cambridge action plan.

How did Cambridge get there?

2010: 2010 Poverty Symposium entitled “Moving Towards an Age Friendly Community”

Early 2011: Received a New Horizons Seniors Program grant to conduct a community needs assessment on local service delivery to determine gaps in availability, accessibility and awareness of services and programs

Conducted an environmental scan on existing services and their delivery

Findings and recommendations presented in a report shared with the local community

End of 2011: Committee Formation began on the Cambridge Age-Friendly Action Plan based on the framework developed by the World Health Organization. The plan was supported through an Ontario Trillium Foundation grant

2012: Conducted events to engage the Cambridge community including:

Community Forum (November 2012) – community dialogue and learning opportunities about seniors housing and aging in place

Community Consultation (December 2012) – prioritized the top 3 recommendations and developed a suggested timeline

2013: Action Plan presented in March 2013. Action plan has begun implementation

What are Cambridge’s next steps?

Implementation of the Action Plan has begun starting with the establishment of an ombudsman to help with health and social supports and access to information.

To learn from other community experiences, visit http://healthy.uwaterloo.ca/~afc/community_stories.html

Strategic Actions

There is a big difference between the development of an action plan and the final adoption of the plan. Since you will be seeking official recognition from a municipal or regional council, balance visionary solutions with a plan that is practical within the local socio-economic context. Only through collaboration, using creativity and insight, can you strike this balance.

The Five-Part Process technique involves developing strategies to make your action plan a reality. This technique has an established history in the field of strategic planning and extends the process for identifying and prioritizing issues for your action plan (see Appendix IV for further detail). Taken together, the strategies you develop through this process will be some of the most important contributions to the AFC planning process, as each strategy will link the goals of the initiative to the changes that are required in the local environment.

These five questions are directly adapted from Bryson’s Five-Part Process strategy model. Have your steering committee address the following questions about each strategic issue as prioritized in the needs assessment (see Appendix IV):

1. What are the practical alternatives we might pursue to discuss this strategic issue?
2. What are the barriers to realizing these alternatives?
3. What major proposals might we pursue to achieve these alternatives directly or to overcome the barriers to realizing them?
4. What major actions (beginning with existing staff working within job descriptions) should you take in the next year, two to three years and five years to implement the major proposals?
5. What specific steps should you take in the next six months to implement the major proposals, and who is responsible for each step?

Ask the second question to anticipate and limit challenges you may face when implementing your plan. It will help broaden the range of potential alternatives as you approach step three, which can lead to options that you might not have identified otherwise.

Ask the fourth and fifth questions to help identify the specifics for implementing your plan. They will help frame how you could implement each alternative. Answer these questions by consulting with any relevant local partners — including them will help establish what is practically possible within the limits of your community’s resources.

Be as specific as possible when addressing the final question. When determining who will be responsible for implementing various strategies in your plan, find out what person or group of persons ‘personally care’ about the issue of AFC. If you cannot identify such a person or group, you may need to look at different partnerships. Remember, in any strategic exercise, people (not organizations) are at the centre of change.

Finally, to make sure that the strategies discuss all of the objectives you identified for your initiative, link each strategy back to the AFC objective(s) it serves and ask about any gaps, conflicts or options for mutual benefit. The way you organize these implementation elements in your action plan depends on your local context. Remember that the final design of your document can be an asset to ensure your message comes through clearly.

Central Ontario

Toronto’s Age-friendly Community Experience

Towards An Age-Friendly City

What has Toronto done?

On May 7, 2013, Toronto City Council unanimously adopted the Toronto Seniors Strategy. Building on existing City work, available research, community consultations and proven best practices, the Toronto Seniors Strategy recommends 91 actions that are practical, achievable, measurable and linked to specific outcomes. To ensure alignment with the efforts of other communities in Canada and around the world, the Strategy was organized according to the WHO framework for age-friendly cities. The City brought together key stakeholders and initiated a multi-lingual consultation process to initiate improvements in a number of areas including:

• staff training on best practices for communicating with vulnerable older adults;
• expanding the Community Paramedicine program;
• lengthening intersection crossing times; and
• developing senior-friendly public education for homeless, at-risk and low income older adults, their families and caregivers, among many others.

How did Toronto get there?

2011: Council directed staff to develop a Seniors Strategy

2012: Public Consultation and Expert Panel Roundtables

Staff conducted demographic research, analysed the implementation of previous

City report recommendations, reviewed best practices and developed actions with the participation of 17 different City agencies, divisions and corporations

2013: Council unanimously adoped the Toronto Seniors Strategy. The Strategy aligns with the WHO , the Government of Ontario’s Action Plan for Seniors and Dr. Samir Sinha’s recommendations to the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care on the development of an Elder-Friendly Ontario

What are Toronto’s next steps?

The City began implementing the 91 recommended actions immediately upon Council approval. Each recommended action includes a time line, a lead City program area responsible for implementation, and a measure by which to monitor the progress of implementation going forward. The Strategy’s accountability and monitoring framework commits to working closely with community partners to support implementation. An initial progress report will be delivered to the new term of Council.

To learn from other community experiences, visit http://healthy.uwaterloo.ca/~afc/community_stories.html