CCEDA continued its series of Conversation Cafés on Thursday December 7th at the Gorge Hall, to discuss the issue of “food security on Cortes Island.” Facilitated by Colin Funk and organised by Kate Maddigan, the event attracted over 20 participants.
CCEDA will be releasing a detailed report on the results of this guided discussion; in the meantime, Currents can offer our readers an overview and a few highlights.
Continue reading CCEDA Conversation Café: Food Security
Elinore Harwood posted a thank-you note in the Tideline last week. Writing on behalf of the Board and membership of the Cortes Island Seniors Society (CISS), she stated that Carina Verhoeve had been ‘a fine Coordinator.’ This was the first indication many Cortes residents had that the ‘Seniors Helping Seniors’ program was no longer being funded. When Cortes Currents contacted Verhoeve, she said the funding for her program had been terminated eight months ago. Now the Seniors Helping Seniors program has been restarted under the auspices of a new senior’s society.
“Seniors Helping Seniors is a wonderful initiative and program. I’m happy that it has started way back, I am happy that it has been going all these years and I am even more happy that it’s continuing. It offers essential services to seniors and if we are lucky, we will all be seniors at some point,” explained Verhoeve.
Continue reading Restart of Seniors Helping Seniors
A number of Cortes Island matters were discussed at the new Electoral Areas Service Committee’s (EASC) Inaugural meeting. This is a special committee made up of the four Strathcona Regional District rural directors and the first stop before their concerns are brought before the full board. The initial discussion of Cortes Island’s proposed Grants in Aid; a Whaletown Community Club request for funding to install a wheelchair ramp at the Old Schoolhouse Art Gallery; and a proposed staff report about liveaboards: were all on the agenda today. As expected Gerald Whalley, the only director to have previously served on the Board, was elected Chair. The big news is that Cortes Island Director Mark Vonesch has been elected Vice Chair.
Continue reading Cortes Island matters at EASC’s Inaugural Meeting
“The Cortes Island Senior Society, as it is now called, was registered in 1987, but previous to that there were seniors groups. I think mainly they called themselves the old age pensioners. They eventually became a seniors group. At some point when they wanted to build, someone told them that they weren’t even called a building society, so they decided to become the Cortes Island Seniors Building Society, which they were for a number of years,” explained Sue Ellingsen, Vice Chair of the Cortes Island Seniors Society.
Continue reading About the Cortes Island Seniors Society
National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
One senior spoke about the anxiety she feels not having a family doctor after losing four in the past eight years.
Another, the president of the local seniors centre, asked what she should tell a woman in her 80s crying on the phone because she’s got nowhere to live and is reduced to the indignity of couch-surfing with friends after a lifetime of paying taxes.
Continue reading With no place to live, some B.C. seniors are couch-surfing
