The seniors' planning tables for Burnaby and New Westminster will have to continue without their lead coordinator, now that United Way funding for the post is coming to an end this April.
Mariam Larson, a gerontologist and the part-time paid coordinator for both planning tables, will be unemployed when the United Way contract ends on April 15.
"I'm troubled by it," Larson said. "I will greatly miss the people I've been working with really deeply. The seniors we have in our community are vibrant and diverse, determined and creative. I've learned so much from them."
Larson has been working with both planning tables for more than five years. She started with the New West table - Seniors Planning and Action Network (SPAN) - in 2008 and Voices of Burnaby Seniors in 2009. She coordinated the groups' meetings and activities, managed communication, took minutes and applied for grants for programs and initiatives they wanted to pursue. The United Way was providing $25,000 per year for each planning table, which covered Larson's position.
Volunteers sit on both planning tables and work with local organizations and civic governments to improve their respective communities for seniors. For example, the New Westminster and Burnaby planning tables both spearheaded campaigns to make their cityscapes more accessible to everyone, especially seniors, by changing sidewalks and ramps to help people in walkers and wheelchairs.
The planning table work will continue but on volunteer labour, Larson said.
"It will go on, but it will be different," Larson said. "They will really have to decide on their priorities and the best way to tackle them as volunteers.
"The one thing I've observed is that we rely on a particular core group of seniors' leaders, and others need to take up the gauntlet because some of the seniors have done more than their share, and it's their turn to do a volunteer retirement of some kind," Larson said. "I look forward to others taking on these roles and continuing the good work."
That may be difficult in New Westminster, according to SPAN chair Bill Zander, who's worked with Larson for years.
"Mariam is a wonderful person, as a gerontologist, but also as our coordinator and our mentor, she does the organizing," Zander said. "SPAN is not going to operate like it did, that's for sure - if we continue to operate - and some people think it may not, but we'll have to look at that in March, which will be the last meeting with Mariam."
Zander said Larson's absence will leave a huge hole that can't be filled by volunteers.
"We're going to certainly miss her," he said. "Her heart is in this community."
Elsie Dean, with Voices of Burnaby Seniors, said Larson's departure is a huge loss.
"It means people have to step in and do what she was doing, and of course, she was doing so much," Dean said. "It seems people are stepping up to the plate, and probably at the next meeting we'll be deciding who will be doing what."
Dean said seniors are concerned about their issues and are coming out to get involved.
"There is a renewed interest on the part of older people to get out and make sure we are all looked after, so I'm enthusiastic about it," she said.
To get involved in either planning table, call Larson at 604-515-1718.
