A Profile Of Older Adult Centres In Ontario

October, 2006

Key Findings

§ The Older Adult Centres= Association of Ontario represents more than 85,000 seniors in Ontario and all Elderly Persons= Centres in Ontario represent more than 150,000 seniors

§ The average membership size of an older adult centre is 903 seniors and the average Centre has more than 31,000 units of service per year

§ Older Adult Centres serve more than 13% of their membership who are between the age of 50 and 65 and 10% of their membership who are over the age of 85

§ Older adult centres in Ontario provide 5.2 million visits per year

§ The average membership fee at an older adult centre is $22.91 per year, representing only 5% of the operating cost of the Centre

§ The average operating cost per member at an older adult centre is $434 per year.

§ The majority of older adult centres receive an Elderly Persons= Centre Grant (73%).

§ The average budget size for an older adult centre is $392,000 per year.

§ More than 21,000 people volunteer at older adult centres in Ontario

§ Over 90% of volunteers in older adult centres remain as volunteers for at least three years and 45% of all volunteers volunteer for more than six years.

§ Over one third of older adult centres provide community support services including congregate dining, day programs, friendly visiting, home maintenance, home making and meals-on-wheels and almost 90% of the older adult centres provide health services.

Profile of Older adult centres in Ontario

I. INTRODUCTION

The Older Adult Centres' Association of Ontario (OACAO) has been promoting the work of older adult centres since 1973. The Association is committed to ensuring that the concept of older adult centres and the unique service delivery model used by centres are a vital component of long-term care services for seniors in Ontario.

The 2006 membership of the Older Adult Centres' Association of Ontario includes more than 80 older adult centres and represents more than 100,000 seniors. The association provides members with the following services;

· Educational services (workshops and conferences)

· Advocacy

· Services to new and emerging Centres

· Research information

· Regional activities

· Older Adult Centre Standards

· Networking

Much of the work that the O.A.C.A.O. does on behalf of its membership involves the promotion of older adult centres. In order to effectively fulfil this role, the O.A.C.A.O. conducts research on the nature and function of older adult centres in Ontario. The findings from this research are used to increase the awareness about the vital role that older adult centres play in communities across Ontario.

In August, 2006, the O.A.C.A.O. conducted a major survey of member centres in Ontario. The purpose of this study was to develop a current profile of older adult centres in Ontario. Major components of this study include:

§ Type of Centres

§ Membership Size

§ Age Distribution of Members

§ Volunteers

§ Membership Fees

§ Elderly Persons’ Centres (EPC) Grant Information

§ Social Contract Reductions

§ Municipal Funding Issues

§ Attendance

§ Involvement in Community Support Services and Health Services

The following report provides a summary of the findings from this survey.

A. History and Definition of Older Adult Centres

In Ontario, older adult centres have been in operation for more than forty years. The very first centres sprang up to meet the needs of low income older adults.

Following the Elderly Persons Centres Act (1966), a number of senior centres were built with the help of provincial government funding. Municipalities which had been working with senior citizen clubs and programs built or renovated buildings as senior centres and provided the staff. In other areas, such as in Greater Toronto, centres sprang up as non-profit agencies with independent boards and more focus on social and health services than the municipal centres.

As senior centres matured, they moved from social-recreation to multi-purpose services. The philosophy of the multi-purpose older adult centre which had its roots in the National Institute of Senior Centres in the United States was one of a holistic approach to service delivery in an atmosphere of wellness with an underlying ‘seniors helping seniors’ methodology.

Older adult centres are not only a service provider within the long-term care system, but they are unique in the way in which they deliver services. As defined by the Canadian Institute of Senior Centres, an older adult centre is “a community focal point on aging where older persons come together for services and activities that enhance their dignity, support their independence and encourage their involvement in and with the community.”

Older adult centres provide an important component of the delivery of long-term care services that goes far beyond the provision of basic recreation or social services. Older adult centres are visible and accessible facilities in the community that serve a full spectrum of older adults, from those individuals who are extremely healthy and self-reliant to individuals who need vital support services to remain living independently in the community. All of these services provided emanate from a wellness perspective and have the ability to encourage and enable older adults to remain living independently in the community.

Older adult centres are very representative of the communities that they serve. One of the founding principles of older adult centres is the involvement of consumers in the operation of a centre ranging from involvement in governance, participation in program planning to active involvement as volunteers.

Older adult centres in Ontario are usually governed by:

§ an elected board which is made up of community members

§ an elected board which is made up of centre members

§ a municipal council through a Parks and Recreation Department

§ a board which is a combination of the above three

§ a board which represents a parent body (such as a church, foundation, etc.)

As well, most centres have a members' council which is active in policy development and decision-making within certain parameters.

II PROFILE OF OLDER ADULT CENTRES IN ONTARIO

A. Type of Centre

The survey results indicate an even split in terms of the type of Centre. Not-for-profit centres represent 49% of the membership while municipal centres also represent 49% of the membership (See Table 1). In terms of governance, 59% of the centres have a Board of Directors while 41% have an Advisory Council.

For OACAO, the even mix of municipal and not-for-profit centres provides an interesting challenge for the Association in terms of membership services. Both types of centre are very unique in their decision making process, governance and service provision. Services provided by the Association must take these differences into account. As an example, OACAO is very active in the OASSIS employee benefits program. However, the majority of the municipal centres would not be interested in the OASSIS program because they have municipal benefits for their employees.

In terms of service provision, municipal centres have tended to lean towards recreation and sports programs, while not-for-profit centres tended to include support services. While this trend is changing in many municipal centres, the municipal centres usually have access to much better recreation resources and infrastructure than the not-for-profit centres. The lack of involvement in community support programs by municipal centres is a direct reflection of their mandate from the local Municipality. Most community support services are delivered by not-for-profit organizations in Ontario.

One of the most alarming differences between municipal and not-for-profit Centres is seen in the construction of new facilities. Municipalities have continued to open new older adult centres over the past 10 years while there have been very few new not-for-profit centres since the early 1980’s. This trend suggests that meeting the demands for leisure and recreation services for seniors is slowly shifting to the municipal sector.

Older Adult Centres in Ontario have a long history in providing services to local communities. A number of Centres began operating prior to 1970 while the big boom in Older Adult Centre growth came between 1970 and 1990 (see Table 2). This growth is congruent with the establishment of the Elderly Persons’ Centres Act which provided capital funding for Older Adult Centres. Since 1990, the growth of new Older Adult Centres has sharply declined and is limited to mostly municipal centres.

B. Membership

Membership Size

The survey results show the average membership size per centre is 903 members (See Table 3). Slightly more than one quarter of the centres have more than 1,000 members (27%) or between 600 and 1,000 members (29%) while there is an even distribution of centres with 200 to 400 members (15%), 400 to 600 members (15%) and 0 to 200 members (15%). This suggests there is a great deal of diversity among the membership of OACAO and specifically between large and small centres.

Within the survey, there were a couple of centres with very large memberships which might affect the reliability of the results. The median number of members per centre (650) is probably a better measure of membership size. In fact, the data indicates that there are 45% of the centres below 600 members and 55% of the centres above 600 members.

One of the most disturbing facts from the 2006 survey is that it indicates a decline in average membership size from 2004 of more than 20%. This trend is supported by the fact that almost half of the respondents (49%) indicated that they are experiencing a decline in membership (See Table 4). The loss in membership tends to be occurring within the larger centres where a number of centres have dropped from more than 1,000 members to between 600 to 1,000 members. The number of centres with more than 1,000 members has dropped from 49% in 2004 to 27% in 2006.

From the survey response, the 41 full member centres represent 37,006 as compared to 47,652 members in 2004. If the same ratio is applied over the entire O.A.C.A.O. membership then the total number of seniors represented by O.A.C.A.O. is 85,000 seniors. If the same ratio is applied for all of the Elderly Persons= Centres in the Province of Ontario then it can be suggested that older adult centres in Ontario serve more than 150,000 seniors.

Age Distribution and Gender

In terms of age distribution, the majority of seniors using older adult centres are between the age of 65 to 74 (43%) followed by seniors between the age of 75 to 84 (34%) (See Table 5). However, younger members (age 50 to 65) do represent an important component of the membership (13%) as do older members (over 85 years of age) (10%). This finding supports the study “Into the Future” that was conducted by the Older Adult Centres’ Association of Ontario in 1995. In this study, it was suggested that older adult centres were serving three distinct client groups: 1) Pre-Retired Adults (age 50 to 65), 2) Active Seniors (age 65 to 80) and 3) Frail Seniors (over 80 years of age).

These results are very similar to the 2004 survey. The only significant finding is that the portion of younger members (50 to 65 years of age) seems to be decreasing slightly while the number of older member (75 to 84 years of age) has increased by 5%. This trend would suggest that older adult centres are not attracting new younger members and that the current membership is simply aging.

Not surprisingly, the survey supports the fact that the majority of members at older adult centres are women (72%) (See Table 6). In fact, only two of the forty centres surveyed indicated that the portion of male members was greater than 40%. It should be noted that both of these centres were smaller in size with less than 175 members.

Attendance

The average annual attendance at older adult centres is 31,479 and for the total survey the average annual attendance is 1,070,316 (See Table 7). For the entire O.A.C.A.O. membership this represents more than 2.1 million visits per year and for all older adult centres in the Province of Ontario this represents more than 5.2 million visits per year.

It is interesting to note that despite declining memberships, participation at older adult centres has increased by more than 25% (26%) since 2004. This trend would seem to suggest two facts; first, an increase in user statistics for the larger centres and second, despite fewer members at many centres, the remaining members are more active.

Another interesting fact about the attendance statistics is that if we make the broad assumption that all of the Centres are receiving the full E.P.C. funding of $30,000, then the funding per visit or unit of service by the Provincial Government is only $0.95 per visit. As a comparison, an Adult Day Centre receives $85.00 per unit in provincial funding and a Meals-On-Wheels program receives $11.00 per unit in provincial funding.

C. Membership Fee

The average membership fee at older adult centres is $22.91 (See Table 8). The majority of Centres have a membership fee between $10 to $20 (38%) or $20 to $40 (51%). There is a definite trend within older adult centres that membership fees are increasing over the past 8 years. For example, in 1998 the average membership fee was $15.62 suggesting an increase of 44% by 2006. Further, in 1998 almost 90% of the Centres had a membership fee of less than $20 while in 2006 only 38% have a membership fee less than $20.00. Very few centres have a membership fee greater than $40.00 (10%).

It is interesting to note that the average operating cost per member per Centre is $434.00 per year. This would indicate that the average membership fee in an older adult centre represents about 5.2% of the operating cost of the centre. However, for the median operating cost per centre, the average membership fee represents more than 11% of the operating cost of the centre. In either case, it is obvious that membership fees make up only a small portion of the operating budget for older adult centres in Ontario.

D. Types of Programs

There are a number of programs and services that are offered by older adult centres aside from the traditional leisure programs (See Table 9). Specifically, more than 86% of the centres offer health promotion programs (86.4%) while many centres also offer computer training (81.8%), health clinics (77.8%) intergenerational programs (60.0%), meal programs (55.6%) and day programs (54.5%). It is also interesting to note that almost one third of the older adult centres offer some type of community support service and over 40% of the older adult centres provide services to specific ethic groups in the community.

Involvement in community support services is supported by the fact that over one third of the older adult centres (34%) receive community support funding from the Ministry of Health (See Table 10). The average amount of community support services funding for those organizations is $327,864 or more than 10 times the amount of the Elderly Persons’ Centres grant.

This inventory of programs offered by older adult centres highlights three important factors for OACAO:

1) The high involvement in community support services suggests that many centres will be entering into a direct funding relationship with the Local Health Integration Networks over the next year. This new partnership will allow these organizations to highlight the benefits of older adult centres with the LHIN’s.

2) Almost all older adult centres are providing health promotion services and health clinics. This role for centres is largely unfunded by the Ministry of Health and represents a future strategy for advocacy activities for OACAO.

3) Almost half of the older adult centres in Ontario are providing services to diverse ethnic populations. This highlights another important role that centres play in communities across Ontario that is not widely recognized by funders at all levels.

E. Volunteers

The average number of volunteers per centre is 134 and the total number of volunteers is 5,512 (See Table 11). The majority of Centres have between 100 and 250 volunteers (34%) while many centres have less than 100 volunteers (32%). Only 17% of the older adult centres have more than 250 volunteers.

Applied over the entire membership, the O.A.C.A.O. represents more than 9,000 volunteers and Elderly Persons Centres in Ontario represent more than 21,000 volunteers.

The average ratio of volunteers to members is 14.8%. Older adult centres have a high dependency on volunteers in all areas of operation. This ratio also supports the concept that older adult centres are volunteer-driven. Despite the high dependency on volunteer resources, less than 1/3 of the centres have a paid volunteer coordinator (31%).

The majority of volunteers in older adult centres are over the age of 65 (42%) though surprisingly more than one third of the volunteers (34%) are between the age of 50 and 65 (See Table 12). Almost 10% of the volunteers in older adult centres are under the age of 18 (8%). This trend may be a result of the mandatory volunteer program in Ontario secondary schools.

The longevity of volunteers within older adult centres is unparalleled among most voluntary sector organizations. More than 45% of the volunteers stay with the centre for 3 to 5 years while another 45% volunteer with centres for 6 or more years including 18% that volunteer more than 10 years (See Table 13). Less than 10% of the volunteers are with a centre for 2 years or less.

Though volunteer support remains strong in older adult centres, it is interesting to note that volunteerism has dropped by 8.4% from the 2004 survey. This is a trend that OACAO will want to monitor in coming years.

F. Funding

The average budget size for older adult centres is $392,000 (See Table 14). The majority of centres have a budget size between $100,000 to $200,000 (29%) while a number of centres also had budget sizes between $200,000 and $300,000 (14.7%), $300,000 to $500,000 (14.7%) and $500,000 to $1,000,000 (14.7%). There were also a number of centres with budgets less than $100,000 (20%).

The majority of the O.A.C.A.O. membership receives funding under the Elderly Persons= Centres Act (73%) (See Table 15). The majority of these Centres are receiving close to the maximum EPC grant of $30,000 and only 7% of the Centres are receiving less than $25,000 (See Table 17). The EPC grant represents a very small portion of the overall budget of most older adult centres. For over half of the respondents in this survery, the EPC grant represented between 0% and 10% of their overall operating budget (See Table 18). Almost 25% of the centres did indicate that the EPC grant represented up to 20% of their operating budget and a further 16% indicated that the EPC grant represented up to 30% of their operating budget. Only 10% of the respondents indicated that the EPC grant represented between 30% and 50% of their operating budget.

In terms of social contract reductions for EPC funding, almost 45% of the Centres (44%) did receive a reduction under the Social Contract (See Table 16). It is interesting to note that almost one third of the centres that did receive a social contract reduction have had that amount reinstated in their EPC funding.

In 2004, one of the emerging concerns for older adult centres was the status of municipal funding. This issue was particularly critical in Toronto where the implementation of the mega city had created a re-rationalization of all community grants. In all municipalities, the impact of Provincial downloading was viewed as a threat to funding for many organizations. The survey results supported the funding concerns for older adult centres in that almost 40% of the Centres (38%) indicated that their municipal funding was at risk in 2004. However, in 2006 this risk factor has reduced to only 15% of the respondents suggesting that municipal funding is not a major risk (See Table 19).

F. Database Software Program

There was a great range in the types of database programs used by older adult centres. However, the CLASS system seemed to be the most popular program for a membership database as it was used by over 37% of the respondents (See Table 20). Access was the next popular program (18.5%) followed by custom databases (12.5%). For registration software, Class was again the dominate choice for older adult centre with more than 85% of the older adult centres using the Class Program (See Table 21). It should be noted that only 50% of the respondents use registration software.

It would appear that much work needs to be done for at least 50% of the membership of OACAO in terms of software for membership database and for program registration. This may be an area that the association can assist the membership in obtaining appropriate software.

III. CONCLUSIONS

The profile of older adult centres in Ontario contains a number of interesting findings. The most impressive findings are the statistics about the impact of older adult centres. The membership and user statistics suggest that older adult centres are a key resource for seniors in the Province of Ontario. There are not many services in Ontario that represent 150,000 seniors or that provide more than 5.2 million units of service per year.

The research also confirms a well known fact about older adult centres in Ontario - they exist with very limited funding. The average budget size of an older adult centre is very small in relation to the number of seniors that it serves. This situation is largely due to the weak funding provided by the Elderly Persons= Centres Act and is further compounded by the ceiling imposed by the E.P.C. Act and the reductions that have become permanent through the Social Contract. The threat of municipal funding reductions represents another issue with which older adult centres must deal.

Despite the limited government funding, older adult centres have maintained very low membership fees. At the average older adult centre in Ontario, it costs an average of .40 cents per week to be a member. Further to this, contributions from membership fees only represent 5% of the total revenue budget.

It is interesting to note that the average membership size in older adult centres has declined within the last two years by more than 20%. With half of the membership in OACAO experiencing declining membership, this should be a concern for the future of older adult centres in Ontario. The slight decline in volunteer participation is also worth watching for the future.

Finally, it is worth noting that many older adult centres are actively involved in providing community support services and health services. For many years, the O.A.C.A.O. has been advocating on behalf of Centres to have older adult centres recognized as part of the long-term care system. This study confirms the important and significant role that Centres play for seniors in Ontario. From one perspective, the findings support the concept of a continuum of services linking older adult centres with community support services. Over 33% of older adult centres are involved in community services. From another perspective, older adult centres play a key role in health promotion and prevention services. More than 90% of older adult centres provide some type of health services.