Co-Creating Sustainable Age-Friendly Communities: Civic Engagement in the Age-Friendly Niagara Movement

Abstract

Since the World Health Organization (WHO) launched its global network for age-friendly cities (AFC) movement in 2010, the number of participating cities and towns, as well as the body of literature focusing on this initiative has grown steadily. Nevertheless, few studies have directly examined how older adult volunteers are involved in AFC planning and initiatives for their municipalities. This study explores the experience of citizen volunteers, mostly older adults, engaging in local municipal-level age-friendly (AF) advisory committees as a part of the Age-Friendly Niagara (AFN) movement in Ontario, Canada. Since its conception as a grassroots movement in 2013, the AFN Network (AFNN) has expanded across the entire region, as each municipal government has appointed its local AF advisory committee or an equivalent, which consists of citizen volunteers, at least one councilor and one municipal staff member. Employing a qualitative multisite case study approach, we conducted focus groups with eight municipal AF advisory committees (or their equivalent) (n = 48, average age 69) to explore their roles, achievements and challenges. Our findings highlight the crucial role older adult volunteers play in their local AFC initiatives as they strive to co-produce and co-create sustainable age-friendly communities in collaboration with their municipal government.

1. Introduction

Since 2007, when the World Health Organization (WHO) launched the Global Age-Friendly Cities Guide as a policy framework for local communities to create physical and social environments to promote active and healthy aging, the number of local communities that have joined this movement has grown steadily [1]. The eight action domains proposed by the WHO—housing, transportation, outdoor spaces and buildings, social participation, respect and social inclusion, civic engagement and employment, communication and information, and community support and health services—are key social determinants of health and well-being for all ages [2,3,4,5]. The popularity of the age-friendly community (AFC) movement reflects a global shift—driven by political and economic austerity—towards a community-based and participatory health promotion approach and the heightened awareness of the vulnerability of older adults during crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic [6,7,8,9].

While the WHO’s AFC framework has been adopted in various forms depending on the local context, there are three main approaches: top-down (e.g., planned and initiated by governments and policy makers), bottom-up (e.g., grassroots action led by citizens and community organizations), or a mixture of the two [9,10,11,12,13]. Based on an iterative review of 67 articles, Pope et al. [13] conceptualized the role of the public sector by using a two-dimensional framework that: (1) targets AF improvements from within the public sector, and (2) connects with and influences outside actors.

Regardless of approach, the principle of the AFC movement is to place older adults at its center in a multi-sectoral collaboration that includes the public sector (e.g., governments) and other organizations in the community [4,5,13]. Ideally, the movement creates opportunities for older adults to participate in planning and implementation of AFC initiatives, which we have learned helps them build capacity, maintain social connections, combat ageism, and support aging in place [2,3,4,5,6,14,15]. To realize this ideal scenario, however, AFC initiatives in each locality need to provide a platform for meaningful civic engagement for older volunteers, especially in community leadership and political advocacy [3,9,10,16,17].

1.1. Literature Review

1.1.1. Overview of AFC Initiatives

As the global AFC movement shifted into its second decade, its achievements and challenges were well documented in the literature (e.g., [2,9,18,19,20,21]). According to the seminal review by Greenfield & Buffel [2], key achievements to date include raising awareness of aging in regional planning; promoting an alternative aging discourse; fostering a community-based model to encourage older adults to be co-producers of practice; and promoting interdisciplinary work in the field of aging. Challenges include the instability of AFC initiatives; constantly changing local politics and leadership; a lack of public support under economic austerity; the COVID-19 pandemic and growing inequality; and the complex organizational structure needed to manage AFC work in diverse socio-political-cultural contexts [2]. Overall, while previous studies have shown the promise of empowering older adults to be “co-producers” or “co-creators” [22] of age-friendly communities, they also have identified various contextual challenges to realizing these outcomes.

1.1.2. Older Adults’ Civic Engagement in AFC Initiatives

Despite the steady increase in scholarly work about AFC initiatives, older adult volunteers’ voices are still few and far between [23,24], as are studies that examine older adults’ engagement in AFC initiatives and/or the role of the public sector [9,13,22,25,26,27]. Various roles for older adults were identified in the previous literature, including collaborators and co-researchers for knowledge creation [24,28,29] or consumers, informants, task assistants, champions, and core group members [27]. According to a recent scoping review by Forsyth and Lyu [24], however, by and large, older adults have played limited roles in AFC initiatives. This aligns with the WHO’s Global Age Network’s 10-year review, which highlighted challenges such as “engaging with and involving older people” and “developing staff and volunteers” [21] (p. 32).

The aim of promoting older adults’ active participation in AFC movements is to foster equity, promote social justice and ensure that public policies safeguard the rights of older adults [10]. Nevertheless, civic engagement and formal volunteering are highly contested in the current neo-liberal discourse. Civic volunteering within the older adult population is often depoliticized [30,31] or exploited as a free resource to meet the needs of post-welfare societies undergoing economic austerity [16]. In a policy analysis of Age-Friendly Toronto, Joy [32,33] argues that the inadequate support and power inequality between partners involved in multi-sectoral AFC governance the neoliberal rationality inherent within the AFC framework has the potential to change the social contract between older adults and the states or municipalities by narrowing the role of community leadership and political advocacy [32,33]. Joy’s critique corresponds to the four contextual factors fostering older adults’ active participation identified by Sixsmith et al. [17]: the provision of accessible and inclusive physical environments; the availability of supportive social networks and services; the creation of opportunities for meaningful engagement in community life; the recognition of the diverse needs of older adults; and the need to involve older adults in the design and implementation process [17].

Given these challenges, some scholars have started exploring how to encourage older adults’ active involvement in AFC movements by speaking to them directly and sharing their voices. Colibaba et al.’s [26] case study interviewed 10 older adult AF volunteers in rural northern Ontario, identifying their concerns about the scope, reach and sustainability of their AFC initiatives, underlining the high risk of volunteer burnout without sufficient resources and support. Similarly, Brossorie et al. [34] interviewed 16 leaders and members of four AFC initiatives in a mid-Atlantic state in the United States. Their findings contrast the perspectives of volunteers from two government-initiated (i.e., top-down) and two provider-initiated (i.e., bottom-up) AFC initiatives. One constant challenge echoed, especially among government-initiated AFC efforts, is finding volunteers and keeping team members engaged. More recently, Cao et al. [23] interviewed 23 older adult volunteers from 15 AFC initiatives across the United States to explore what they value about their civic participation. The three values identified are: social contribution, social connectedness and integration, and staying active and augmenting personal growth. The authors argue that older adults’ engagement is both social and political; volunteering for AFC initiatives provides opportunities not only to socially connect, contribute and grow, but also to influence local policies and practices as a group.

Building on this body of scholarly work, our study explores the experiences of older adult volunteers from municipal-level age-friendly advisory committees in the AFN movement to answer the following three questions: How are the local AF committees structured and operated? How are older adult volunteers involved in municipal AF advisory committees? How do they perceive the achievements and challenges of committee work?

2. Methodology

2.1. Study Setting: Age-Friendly Niagara (AFN) Movement and Municipal AF Advisory Committees

The Niagara region in Ontario comprises 12 municipalities, both rural and urban. The region, which had a total population of 525,352 in 2023 [35], is one of the most rapidly “greying” areas in Canada; In 2021, 23.3% of Niagara residents were 65 years and older, much higher than 18.5% of Ontario residents overall [36]. The Age-Friendly Niagara Network (AFNN) Leadership Council was formed by forward-thinking older adult volunteers in 2013 in partnership with Niagara Connects (now called Community Potential), a community organization which supports networking through information and knowledge exchange. After a decade of tireless outreach, as of 2024, all 12 municipalities had formed their own council-appointed local AF advisory committees (or a differently named equivalent). All local AF committees in the Niagara region are under the authority of the municipality with a “terms of reference”, and their monthly meetings are open to the public. Typically, committee size ranges between 9 and 16, including a chair, citizen members (mostly older adults), at least one liaison municipal staff person and one councillor. A citizen member’s term is typically four years and renewable, the same length as a term on a municipal council [37].

In 2022, the grassroots AFNN Leadership Council became the Niagara Age-Friendly Council (NAFC), a non-profit charitable organization, whereas the 12 local AF advisory committees formed a formal coalition called Niagara Older Adults Alliance (NOAA) [38]. With the leadership of the region-wide AFNC, local AF advisory committees across Niagara meet regularly to share information and collaborate. Guided by the region-wide strategies for advancing Niagara as a “community for all ages”—the 2015 Niagara Aging Strategy and Action Plan [39] and the 2023 report based on results from the Empowering Older Adults in Niagara Survey [40]—each local AF advisory committee independently assesses, plans and organizes various local initiatives to meet needs in their municipality [37]. In short, over the last decade, the AFN movement has successfully built a social infrastructure in collaboration with municipal governments and various community organizations.

2.2. Study Design

In this paper, we present a portion of our larger community-engaged qualitative study with older adult volunteers, focusing on those serving on local AF advisory committees. Following previous research [23,26,34], we employed a qualitative methodology, suitable for exploring and understanding older volunteers’ experiences and insights in context [41]. We employed a multiple or multisite case study approach, with the region-wide AFN movement as the larger case that embeds smaller cases of municipal-level local AF advisory committees. The comparison of multisite cases allowed us to identify patterns of alignment and variation to increase the validity of the results [41,42].

The university research team comprised three faculty researchers (MN, PG, and LM) whose research is focused on the field of aging, and three student research assistants with a public health background. One researcher (LM) was a past member of the region-wide AFN Leadership Council, for the others, however, this was their first experience with the AFN. The university research team worked in collaboration with a community advisory group consisting of four older “trailblazers” of the AFN movement, providing valuable intergenerational learning opportunities for everyone involved. The study obtained ethics clearance from Brock University in May 2021 (File No. 20-295).

The community advisory group was helpful throughout the research process, and, in particular, during recruitment, as they connected us to a liaison person who emailed a recruitment flyer and an invitation letter to potential participants from each of the local AF advisory committees. The data collection was conducted via Zoom video and telephone between May and July 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in Ontario. Focus groups were used as they allowed researchers to gain insight from a variety of perspectives while observing group dynamics [41]. We conducted a total of nine semi-structured focus groups in nine municipalities; however, for this study, we used the data from the eight groups that had formally established AF committees. Each focus group consisted of two to 11 people from the same local AF committee, most of whom were retirees or older adult volunteers (n = 45). We also conducted three individual telephone interviews (n = 3) using the same interview guide with people who wanted to participate but struggled with technology. These data were later integrated into the focus group data from the AF committee that each belonged to. All participants also completed an online survey to capture demographic characteristics and approximate hours spent volunteering.

Each focus group was conducted in English by at least one university researcher and two student assistants and lasted between 90 and 120 min. The questions included the structure and operation of their committee, and the achievements and challenges of their committee work. To enhance active discussion, facilitators asked broad, open-ended questions regarding each topic area, while probing to solicit concrete examples. We encouraged all participants to contribute, reminding them that there were no right or wrong answers, that diverse and honest viewpoints were wanted, and that group consensus was not necessary. Questions evolved as the focus group interviews progressed. For example, after the first focus group, we found that many participants were engaged not only in the local AF advisory committee but also in multiple community volunteer projects. As such, we added the question: “How do you see the uniqueness of AF committee work compared to other volunteer work?” All data were video- and/or audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. An honorarium (a gift card valued at C$20) was mailed to every participant after the data collection.

Data analysis started right after the first focus group was conducted [41], following five steps. First, after each focus group and telephone interview, the research team held a debriefing to create a detailed summary table that listed all answers to each question, key supporting quotations, and reflective memos for potential themes in the preliminary analysis. Second, this summary was emailed to every participant of the focus group for member checks. Third, after refining the summary tables with participants’ feedback for all eight focus groups, the research team met again to compare the eight summary tables to generate overarching themes. Fourth, once overarching themes were finalized, the first author (MN) and a student assistant (MG) went through all transcripts one by one to verify if the themes were supported by evidence, while creating matrices with key themes and supporting quotations with the help of NVivo 12. Finally, to obtain feedback, the research team presented the results at an online public forum and in a written report for the community advisory group and the participants.

Throughout the process, we implemented strategies to enhance the rigor and trustworthiness of our qualitative study. Following Lincoln and Guba’s [43] framework, rigor was supported through consistent and systematic data collection and analysis procedures, while trustworthiness—reflecting the credibility, dependability, confirmability, and transferability of the findings—was fostered through multiple validation strategies. Specifically, we employed researcher triangulation by involving multiple members of the research team in data collection and independent analysis of the same data sets, followed by collaborative discussions to compare interpretations and confirm emerging themes. We also conducted member checks by sharing summary sheets with participants immediately after each focus group and later presenting the final findings in a community report and a public forum to obtain participants’ feedback and validation. In addition, we used maximum variation sampling to purposefully include diverse advisory committees across the region, allowing for a broad range of perspectives and enhancing the transferability of the results [41].

2.3. Participants from the Eight Local AF Advisory Committees

A total of 48 people from the eight local AF advisory committees participated in this study, with an average age of 69 years (See

Table 1. Demographic characteristics of participants from eight focus groups (n = 48).

Age	Average age = 69 80s (11%), 70s (41%), 60s (41%), 50s (7%)
Gender	Women (73%) Men (25%) Other (2%)
Education	Post secondary and higher (69%) High school (8%) Other (23%)
Living Arrangement	With spouse/family/others (85%) Living alone (15%)
Immigrant Status	Born in Canada (85%) Immigrated to Canada (15%)
Average volunteer hours	25 h/month (for overall volunteering) 10 h/ month (for AF committee related volunteering) 88% involved multiple volunteer work.

: Demographic characteristics of participants from eight focus groups). The majority were women with a post-secondary or higher educational background, born in Canada, who spent an average of 10 h a week on AF committee-related work. Eighty-eight percent (88%) reported other volunteer commitments in addition to their AF committee work. Many of the participants are “lifelong volunteers” who began their volunteer experiences as young children and continued throughout their lives.

Among the eight municipalities that were included in this study, five were cities, two were towns, and one was a township. All eight committees were listed on their municipal government websites. As of June 2021, three committees had been in existence for 12 years; one for 10 years; one for four and two for two years. Five had obtained the WHO’s designation. The names of each committee differed and included “seniors advisory”, “older adults advisory” and “AF advisory”.

Despite differences, our comparative analysis of eight cases found that they shared common characteristics in their structure, roles and activities. At the same time, each committee faced unique challenges in planning and implementing its AFC initiatives due to differing needs and available resources. The following sections illustrate our three major themes.

3. Results

3.1. “It Takes a Whole Team for a Committee to Be Effective”

Our first overarching theme related to the composition of each local AF committee. As illustrated in Table 1, while volunteers were relatively homogeneous in terms of age, gender, socio-economic status and ethno-racial backgrounds, each local AF committee included volunteers with various professional and personal backgrounds including former civil servants, teachers, nurses and doctors, accountants, local business owners, homemakers, administrators of community agencies, newly arrived residents, those living with a long-term disability, Francophones, and others who were 2SLGBTQA+. All volunteers learned about the AF committee positions from advertisements on their municipal government website, their community newspaper, or by “word of mouth” through their personal network. Six out of eight committees said that the selection typically involved an interview with the councillor or municipal staff, and yet not with current AF committee members.

Participants in all eight focus groups expressed appreciation for their fellow volunteers’ strengths. One participant said, “For a committee to be effective, it’s not just one person, it takes a whole team” (FG2 participant). “There are a lot of different skills being used, from making sandwiches for community events to writing grants for funding applications,” (FG3 participant) said another.

In addition, all eight committees included representatives from other council-appointed committees, such as joint accessibility, public library, active transportation, and senior centers. Three committees intentionally included a youth advisory committee representative as well. Older adult volunteers valued this type of cross-sectoral collaboration. As one participant explained, “Part of our mandate was to try to infiltrate other committees and try to incorporate their work for seniors” (FG3 participant). Another participant added more context:

This committee comes up with specific ideas, like bus passes for seniors. We need knowledgeable members from varied backgrounds and people on various other committees. We are not just going to the council and saying we need lower bus fees. Since I have inside knowledge as a previous councillor, I know that we can have input with the council.

(FG6 participant)

These comments suggest that the local AF advisory committees’ structure fosters inter-committee networking within each municipality.

Seven out of eight committees had a municipal staff member who was either a clerk or a member of the leisure and recreation department and acted as liaison with the AF committee. Participants generally echoed their appreciation for such administrative assistance since “There is only so much that volunteers can do” (FG8 participant). Examples of practical administrative assistance these people offered include assistance for monthly public committee meetings, research and grant writing, and carrying out community events. As some participants commented: “Our city clerk or a deputy clerk attends every meeting, and guides us through protocols, and they are there for any issues that we need to bring to the city” (FG3 participant). “During the summer months, the staff usually finds a student helper for us to set up events” (FG5 participant). “The city staff provide secretarial and research assistance, as well as management support” (FG2 Participant).

In addition, six out of eight committees included elected council members at the time of the study. Council members joined the committee voluntarily, offering their knowledge and political support and bringing the committee’s recommendations back to council meetings. One participant said, “Councillors bring so much knowledge and provide an additional insight into the direction that our town goes” (FG4 participant). Importantly, older volunteers on committees where councillors were actively involved really felt “heard and supported”: “The city council is 100% behind what we do” (FG3 participant). This was notably different from the frustration expressed by a couple of participants who belonged to the committees that lacked a council member.

Besides these administrative and political supports, as a council-appointed municipal advisory committee, all have stable financial support. Seven out of eight committees had been allotted an annual budget from the municipal government that ranged between C$1000 and C$5000. The chair of the committee that lacked an annual budget explained, “We have no defined budget, but can access funds on a needs-specific basis” (FB8 participant). In summary, we found that the local AF advisory committees in the Niagara region share a similar structure that facilitates the co-production of AFC initiatives, enabling citizen volunteers and municipal governments to collaborate effectively.

3.2. “Advocating for a Community for All Ages”: Roles of the Local AF Advisory Committees

The second theme involves the roles that older adult volunteers play in each community. Participants in all eight focus groups spoke of their understanding of an “age-friendly community” as referring to an inclusive and accessible “community for all ages”, reflecting the common goal of the broader region-wide AFN movement and aligning with the WHO’s AFC framework: “We are very aware of the concept of age-friendliness and the value of all age groups. We’re not just about the seniors. We think about all age groups”(FG7 participant). “Age-friendly is an inclusive world. It’s about everyone. Things needed by older people are also needed by mom and a baby too” (FG1 participant). Five out of eight committees emphasized their intergenerational focus. One participant described, “The bulk of our mandate is to target all ages. For example, a bocce ball tournament is where grandparents bring grandchildren to play together” (FG3 participant).

Participants also described their committee’s main roles as an “advocate” for other older adults, a “liaison” between older adults and their families and the councils, to identify barriers, provide advice to the council, and inform other older adults and their family members. In these broad roles, they were involved in a range of tasks and activities.

Table 2. Typical volunteer tasks and activities of the local AF advisory committees.

1 Attending a two-hour formal monthly meeting that is open to the public. Some committees strike project-based sub-committees or working groups for ad hoc meetings.

2 Conducting a community needs assessment (e.g., administrating surveys by knocking on doors and facilitating focus groups)

3 Developing action plans and strategies for local AFC initiatives

4 Advocating their recommendations to the municipal council

5 Organizing events to inform and educate older adults and family members (e.g., health fairs, community forums with guest speakers, family sports events)

6 Searching for external funding opportunities and writing grant proposals

7 Writing an annual report to submit to the council

shows the seven tasks typically reported by the eight local AF committees.

As Table 2 shows, volunteering at a local AF advisory committee involves time-consuming teamwork requiring diverse skills and knowledge, including communication, networking, administration, research, negotiation, and advocacy. For example, seven out of the eight committees conducted an extensive community needs assessment. Older adult volunteers in some committees collected the data for themselves. One participant reflected,

In our committee, we went out and conducted the surveys and focus groups. I knocked doors of seniors’ buildings. We were able to directly communicate with the seniors to learn their needs. One thing we didn’t expect was that doing this survey allowed people to come to us and communicate with us.

(FG6 participant)

Based on the needs identified, each committee developed its own “action plan” to identify and implement events and projects in partnership with the municipal government and other community organizations. Some examples include: a volunteer fair, an educational forum, an AFC business guide, family events, a cable TV program for seniors, advocating for affordable housing, and a weekly coffee house.

While COVID-19 was a huge setback to the momentum and implementation of activities, with technical support from municipal staff, five out of the eight were able to continue monthly meetings during the lockdown, and work continued. For example, during the pandemic, two committees opened “Senior Centers without Walls”, where older adults could call in to socialize and learn about topics of interest. Another committee organized an outdoor activity (i.e., a seniors’ garden) where older adults could tend a public garden together in a socially distant way. One committee tried a pilot bus project in which the fare was reduced for older adults to encourage them to get out rather than stay at home. While a few committees had to suspend activities during the COVID-19 pandemic, committees with good support from the municipality were able to continue to support older adults in their communities at a time when many were in great need.

Taken as a whole, participants’ accounts suggest that their volunteer committee work derives from a spirit of advocacy for others (and for themselves) and that it takes time, effort and patience to be effective and successful. As one participant described their decision-making process: “It takes time and patience to work as a team. But teamwork is necessary for getting the project done. We are talking things out, sometimes trying two or three rounds so that everyone agrees at the end” (FG3 participant).

3.3. Pride in the Positive Changes They Made in Their Communities

The third theme is related to the concrete outcomes of older adults’ volunteering at their local AF advisory committees. All eight focus groups expressed pride about the positive changes they helped to achieve in their community. As one participant said, “You have to see the changes being made!” (FG3 participant). Their achievements can be divided into major, incremental, and those that were especially frustrating.

Major achievements. Participants, especially long-term members of well-established AF committees, echoed that pride. For example, one committee described their decade of advocacy work with various community partners as follows: “To get a hospice here in our city, it took around 10 years. Sometimes you must know something will take time” (FG2 participant). Other committees reported their success in promoting the construction of two affordable apartment buildings for older and lower-income adults.

Many people in this city don’t have enough. When you earn C$1600/month and your rent is C$1400, you only have $200 left. That’s why we needed to build affordable housing. We advocated, and the City built two low-income housing facilities. But we still have 500 people on the waiting list. I want to continue this because this group is moving forward and forward-looking. Our committee is helping the city.

(FG3 participant).

Incremental achievements. Many committees also talked about smaller-scale, gradual achievements. One group described how raising the “AFNN flag” they themselves had designed has become an annual event in many cities and towns across the region in June, kicking off seniors’ month in Canada. One committee advocated for chess tables and exercise equipment in outdoor spaces, while another group pushed successfully for traffic signs with larger fonts. One participant proudly talked about their successful recommendation to the city council to reduce the property tax rebate for low-income seniors.

The current C$40 is not a lot, so we tried to bump it up. Everyone was in favour of this idea. In November, I did a report on affordable housing where the committee accepted all five motions, and the council accepted all five as well! (a big smile)!

(FG6 participant)

A member of the newest committee talked about their one-day seniors’ community forum, which had been held in collaboration with a public library—the first of its kind in their rural community:

It was a lot of work to prepare. We brainstormed, contacted potential partners, and worked more than 100 hours in total to prepare it. Well, sometimes it’s a little overwhelming during the busy time. But it was a BIG success. We provided an education session about computer fraud protection, and 14 different community organizations set up booths to give out information. We provided lunch and entertainment activities such as a local choir. There were about 250 seniors in attendance!

(FG1 participant).

Frustrating outcomes. Many committees also described efforts that “flopped” or left them frustrated due to the time it took to obtain things through the local political and bureaucratic system (e.g., persuading local stores to add ramps, informing and motivating older adults to join community events, convincing councils to adopt their recommendations, etc.). As one committee chair described,

The time that it takes to get things done is very frustrating. We proposed something, but six years have passed, and we are still not seeing all the changes we need. But I am very proud of our persistence. We don’t give up easily (laughter)!

(FG5 participant)

As this comment suggests, AF committee work requires patience and persistence, and a willingness to navigate municipal politics. The collegiality and solidarity that members developed over the years, despite their frustrations, may be seen as building “community capacity”, an important achievement in its own right.

3.4. Challenges and Dilemmas as a Formal Municipal Committee Volunteer at Various Levels

Despite these achievements, all eight committees reported challenges and dilemmas at the group, community, and societal levels.

At the group level. While all eight local AF advisory committees expressed their appreciation for their collaborative relationship with—and administrative, political, and budgetary support from—the municipal government, two committees expressed their frustration with their limited capacity as a municipal advisory committee. As the chair of one committee explained.

The most frustrating thing is the walls put up by the terms of reference. I don’t like it when simple, straightforward things take a long time to get done. As an advisory committee, we don’t have a lot to do beyond just providing information and recommendations. So, the issues we cannot address need to be addressed differently.

(FG5 participant)

As this comment suggests, a recommendation from an AF committee must first pass as a motion at council, after which the municipal government decides how quickly to implement the volunteers’ advice. This bureaucratic process can take a long time. Another inherent dilemma is the unpredictable nature of the committee itself. Illustrating this fact, we learned how one committee was completely disbanded when the make-up of the council changed and it took years and the tireless advocacy by older adults in the community to be reinstated.

Another dilemma reported by several committees was the turnover of citizen volunteers. Participants identified several reasons for this, including some had to halt their volunteering due to health issues; some new members found the formality of municipal committee volunteering too daunting, while others felt there was just too much work for too few dedicated volunteers. One long-term committee suggested that this could be prevented if proper information was provided in advance to incoming volunteers about what they were committing to: “We think it’s more about telling the person what the committee is about and getting to know the person better than is possible in a typical interview” (FG2 participant). Four committees reported that the fact that they “have no say” in the intake process (e.g., interviews) is a point of real frustration. When vacancies emerge due to volunteers’ turnover in the middle of the term, it is councils that usually select replacements.

At the community level. All eight committees mentioned how challenging it was to raise the AF advisory committee’s profile in their local community, especially among other older adults. Despite their desire to play the role of advocate or liaison, they had trouble obtaining information from and to other older adults in their community, something they connected to their invisibility. One participant said, “In general, lots of people are still not aware of our committee. We must make our presence more known” (FG1 participant). Some of this difficulty was attributed to their reliance on the internet, given the digital divide among older adults, many of whom cannot afford the internet, or have limited access in rural areas:

I do have access to the internet and cable. Still, a little bit down the road, the Internet company said “No” to hooking them up with services due to the poor connectivity […] We may need to take this digital divide to the council and speak to them about how they can solve this problem.

(FG7 participant)

Some rural areas still lack broadband access to the internet and wireless phones. This poses a major challenge for the local AF committee members to get information out, a lack that was further amplified during the COVID-19 lockdowns when most activities had moved online.

At the societal level. Since this study was conducted during the COVID-19 lockdowns, all eight committees, unsurprisingly, reported that the pandemic stimulated their momentum. Many participants expressed concerns about the long-term impact of the pandemic on older adults’ social isolation:

Everything is in a state of change. COVID-19 means it will change again. The impacts of this pandemic, especially social isolation, are far-reaching, and they are already deep among the seniors’ population. Some of the changes that have been made during the pandemic will be permanent.

(FG4 participant)

Besides the pandemic, some participants, especially longer-term older volunteers in their late 70s and 80s, stressed how ageism or negative perceptions about older adults create barriers to their civic engagement: “I see ageism a lot nowadays, and it’s horrible that people see us [older adults] as having no value. But it’s the opposite, we have lots of value, we have so much to offer” (FG5 participant). “There is an ageism that exists in our society that pushes out older adults. This includes some politicians. A fundamental cultural shift needs to happen where people recognize the importance of older adults and their contributions” (FG8 participant). Despite these challenges, all eight local AF municipal committees were able to navigate the maze of local politics, even during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the next section, we will discuss what we have learned about the sustained progress of the AFN movement, focusing on the nature of civic engagement among AF committee volunteers in relation to their municipal governments.

4. Discussion

Older adult volunteers at the eight local AF advisory committees emphasized that their civic engagement is not only social (i.e., working together as a collegial team) but also political (i.e., advising and advocating for improving their communities). Engagement requires a range of skills, knowledge and leadership to carry out research, planning, networking, organizing public events, and advocacy work. In particular, the issues they advocate for, such as affordable housing, access to transportation and information, increased opportunities for social participation, and improved health and community care services are well aligned with the areas identified by the Niagara Aging Strategy and Action Plan, the more recent Empowering Older Adults in Niagara Survey [39,40] and the WHO’s AFC framework [4,5]. This finding aligns with what Cao et al. [23] found in their study; volunteering in an AFC leadership position provides opportunities for social connection and personal growth, as well as the opportunity to influence local policies and practice [23].

The AFN movement adopted a “mixed approach” which combined bottom-up (older adult volunteer-driven) and top-down (local municipal government devised) approaches [9,12,13]. This meant it could create relatively solid social AFC infrastructure across the region without losing its original spirit as an older adults-led grassroots movement. While there are differences, most of the eight committees led by older adults received human (i.e., municipal liaison staff) resources, modest but stable financial resources (i.e., annual budget), and political support (i.e., at least one member was there to push their recommendations in council meetings). This approach aligns with one of the two conceptual cocategories of public sectoral roles proposed by Pope et al. [13], as each municipal government connects with outside actors in the community, leading multisectoral AFC committees, while providing technical assistance and funding to co-facilitate AFC development and implementation. In the case of our study, the key “outside actors” are citizen volunteers. There is no doubt that the structure and operational style of the local AF advisory committees, and particularly the formal integration within the municipal structure, contributed greatly to the sustainability of the AFN movement over the last 12 years. A finding similarly evidenced in previous studies [7,13,20,44,45].

Nevertheless, while steady support from municipal governments helps mitigate the risks posed by short-term funding and the lack of financial and human resources identified in previous studies [45,46,47], we also observed variations in the extent of municipal government support, which seemed to influence the activity levels, motivations and frustration of older adult volunteers. More research is needed in this area. Insufficiently funded committees need to repeatedly apply for other funding sources (e.g., regional, provincial, and federal) to implement their larger projects, and there is unpredictability when municipal councils change. These contextual challenges hindering older adult volunteers’ civic engagement correspond to what previous literature has identified (e.g., non-statutory requirements, inequities of financial and human resources in small and rural communities, the administrative silo effect preventing collaboration in municipal governments, and a lack of geographic connectivity [2,7,29,44,45]. Many of these are inherent in the ambiguous status of the AFC initiatives in regional and municipal policies [46,47,48,49].

While our findings demonstrate that active involvement in neighborhood and community activities encourages civic engagement among older adults [10], we also learned how over-reliance on older adult volunteers and power inequalities between partners involved in multi-sectoral AFC governance can lead to volunteer burnout. This is especially true in smaller and rural communities with limited community resources [26,45,50]. These foreseeable challenges reflect the four factors fostering older adults’ active civic engagement identified by Sixsmith et al. [17]: (1) the provision of accessible and inclusive physical environments and the availability of supportive social networks and services; (2) the creation of opportunities for meaningful engagement in community life; (3) the recognition of the diverse needs of older adults; and (4) involving older adults in the design and implementation process.

As Brossorie et al. [34] found in their study of government-initiated AFC initiatives, participants’ accounts in our study suggest that, as a council-appointed formal committee, older adult volunteers have to deal with top-down bureaucratic constraints from time to time. However, older adult volunteers, many of whom are skilled and resourceful leaders with various professional and life experiences, are often able to find ways to navigate the maze of local politics and patiently push their recommendations forward. It was impressive to witness how many participants, especially long-term dedicated older volunteers, saw themselves as “agents of change” in their local communities and viewed their municipal government as their “partner” rather than their “boss”. In this way, the AFN movement provides meaningful civic engagement for older adults [3,9,17].

The eight municipalities in Niagara have adopted the “co-production approach” [3,22], in which the government offers its competencies and resources to encourage citizens’ participation in the production and delivery of public services. Scaling up their support in all three areas (i.e., budget, administrative, and political), however, would promote more active civic engagement by the AF committee, sending a stronger message to the older adult volunteers that they are recognized and appreciated as “co-producers” of community services.

Ideally, as advocated by Ansell and Torfing [22], municipalities in Niagara should adopt a “co-creation” approach—treating older adult AF committee volunteers as equal partners in the decision-making process, and moving away from what can feel like tokenism. We found local AF committee members to be socially conscious and highly skilled individuals who are able to assess community needs and make recommendations. As Ansell and Torfing [22] noted, the co-creation process enables citizens not only to work on the problems proposed by politicians but also to identify new problems. The adoption of co-production and co-creation approaches in the AFC movement creates channels for meaningful civic engagement for older adults, while promoting a new form of generative public governance in municipalities [22]).

5. Strengths and Limitations

Our study helps fill gaps in the AFC literature, contributing to a better understanding of older adult volunteers’ engagement and what they perceive as their movement’s achievements and challenges [9,23,25,26,27]. In addition, examining the structure and operation of eight local AF advisory committees in detail provides further insights into the role that a municipal government can play to support and/or hinder older volunteers’ meaningful civic engagement for co-producing and co-creating age-friendly communities [13,22]. Nevertheless, this study has certain limitations. Due to a lack of internet access in rural communities, the digital divide, and health issues among older adult volunteers, we were not able to interview all older adult members of the committees. In addition, older adults in three out of twelve municipalities in the region were unable to participate, partly because some postponed committee-related activities due to the COVID-19 lockdown. While our research team members worked well together in virtual data collection, findings would have been strengthened by incorporating additional data sources and data collection methods -- such as in-person interviews and extended observation of committee meetings and community events. Lastly, this study focuses mainly on AF committee volunteers and does not include older adult volunteers involved in AFC initiatives in other roles or capacities (e.g., as “informants” and “task assistants” in Greenfield and Reyes’ [27] typology). Future research should incorporate older adult volunteers involved in AFC initiatives at various levels. It is also important to explore policymakers’ perspectives on the possible role of municipal governments in supporting older adults’ civic engagement in making their local communities more age-friendly.

6. Conclusions

Despite the challenges posed by the COVID-19 lockdowns, we conducted this study in close collaboration with older adult volunteers engaged in the AFN movement. Civic engagement among older adults is often depoliticized [30,31] and exploited as a free resource to meet the needs of post-welfare societies undergoing economic austerity [16]. However, if community contexts, structures, and partnerships are supportive, older adults can be co-producers or even co-creators of age-friendly communities. The central take-home lesson from the AFN movement to this point is that stable financial, administrative, and political support and investments from municipal governments in local AFC initiatives can motivate, empower and mobilize older adults as a valuable community resource for innovative solutions.

Despite their successes, however, local AF advisory committees in Niagara are not immune to the fundamental challenges inherent in the current global AFC movement. These include an uncertain position with non-statutory status [48]; the uncertainty caused by ever-changing local politics and leaders [2]; an overdependence on volunteers and local communities [26,45,50]; and, finally, the persistent ageism in our society. To ensure that the global AFC movement can achieve the goals of the UN’s Decade of Healthy Aging, it needs to expand, not only in terms of top-down aging policy, but also as a social and cultural movement. The civic engagement of older adults can lead to a productive and cost-efficient form of co-creation of caring, enabling, and inclusive local communities, while simultaneously addressing the persistent hold of ageism. We hope that this case study, which illustrates how older adults are empowered by and contribute to the AFN movement, will help other communities facilitate that process.