Age Friendly
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“<br />
Former Minister for Justice and TD for Dublin North,<br />
Nora Owen is the independent chair of the Fingal <strong>Age</strong><br />
<strong>Friendly</strong> programme. Aware of the significance of genuine<br />
engagement of senior managers in each sector, Nora<br />
has used her personal contacts to ensure that the HSE<br />
became fully involved in the process. “The advantage of an<br />
independent chairperson is that it can lift the <strong>Age</strong> <strong>Friendly</strong><br />
strategy out of the council so that it’s not just another<br />
policy area that might or might not work. The chairperson<br />
needs to encourage proactive involvement from all the<br />
senior managers and there is a need for quarterly meetings<br />
to give everyone a group to report back to,” says Owen.<br />
106<br />
The key to achieving the aims of the <strong>Age</strong> <strong>Friendly</strong> strategy<br />
is for it to be “embedded” and “mainstreamed” within the<br />
organisations that support it. “We found that transport<br />
was an issue for Fingal and we have addressed that.<br />
Now, housing is emerging as an issue – up to now, the<br />
Council wasn’t building anything so now, we need to look<br />
for some interesting models for housing for older people.<br />
For example, rather than setting aside a percentage of<br />
units for older people, the Council could consider buying<br />
a building and adapting it for use like what developed<br />
”<br />
in<br />
MacAuley Place in Naas, County Kildare.”
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