By Jennifer Brooks, Council on Aging of Ottawa
Ninety six per cent of older adults want to age in place and live independently for as long as possible. Most of us will need health, social and physical supports to do so with dignity and grace. The Naturally Occurring Retirement Community – Supportive Service Program (NORC-SSP) is an innovative housing model that can provide these supports.
A NORC is a geographic designation for a rental, condominium, co-op or social housing building that evolved naturally over time, where at least 30 per cent of residents are older than 65 years. NORCs can be vertical (as in an apartment/condo building) or horizontal (as in a neighbourhood block or adult lifestyle community). Retirement homes and long-term care homes are not NORCs.
A NORC Supportive Service Program or simply NORC Program is attached to a particular NORC community and provides a range of health, social, recreational, educational and physical supports and services on site. These supports and services are designed by residents themselves or obtained through collaborative relationships with outside agencies such as Oasis Seniors Supportive Living, Ottawa Public Health, pharmacies, community health centres, government bodies and community partners. NORC programs are resident led, driven and run in the building’s shared space.
An exemplary model of a NORC Program is Oasis Seniors Supportive Living, begun in Kingston, Ontario in 2009. Oasis is a partnership between the residents of Bowling Green apartments, Homestead Realties (the property owner), the Council on Aging Frontenac-Kingston and Home and Community Care Support Services (formerly the Local Health Integration Network). These agencies provide the permission, promotion, financial resources and paid co-ordinator to run the Oasis program.
Oasis is so successful that researchers at Queens University, with colleagues from Western and McMaster, partnered with Kingston in 2018 to expand and evaluate the program’s impact on the health of older adults. The researchers believe that if the pillars of Oasis—reduce social isolation, improve mobility and physical activity, improve nutrition and provide a sense of purpose—are optimized through relevant programing and a paid co-ordinator, health impacts will be realized.
Research results to date are significant. Older adults living in a building with Oasis broadened and deepened their social connections, improved mental health and overall well-being, improved engagement in physical activity and other meaningful activities and improved access to essential health services. These impressive early results are a testament to the success of the program, now expanded to 19 sites across Canada, and how the Oasis/NORC model supports older adults to stay in their communities.
The Council on Aging of Ottawa (COA) began discussions with Queens University in 2019 to bring Oasis to Ottawa. Ambleside Condominiums, with three separate towers, was chosen as Ottawa’s first Oasis site in 2022. Another site was recently approved in the spring of 2024. Residents call themselves The Ambleside Movement. They hope to inspire and help other NORCs develop their own NORC programs. Ambleside addresses the goals of Oasis through its paid co-ordinator and resident-driven program and is forming partnerships with a local pharmacy for education and vaccine administration. The group applied for and received federal grant funding to run its own Men’s Shed and pilot two wellness clinics. These clinics include the services of a local Community Health Centre, pharmacy and paramedic service. Ambleside has also forged partnerships with local businesses, community service providers, Olde Forge Community Resource Centre and the COA. Best of all, the program has resulted in friendships, formed amongst residents in each of the formerly isolated towers. “This is the real power of NORCs,” one resident said.
The COA is a catalyst for and a promotor of NORC Programs in Ottawa. We sit on the Oasis Steering Committee at Ambleside. We partnered with Ottawa Neighbourhood Solutions to create an interactive virtual map that identifies the 170 NORCs in Ottawa (derived from a larger map of Ontario NORCs produced by UHN Open Lab in 2021). The map includes apartments, condos and co-ops and identifies the address, type of building and percentage of older adults over age 65 who reside in a particular NORC. The council uses the map to target our Smart Aging Program, Emergency Preparedness course (produced by The Red Cross) and our newly developed NORC module, which helps residents explore the possibilities within their own NORC. We believe the map will assist those wanting to bring health, social and physical supports and services to older adults, researchers, politicians and older adults looking for alternative housing options. In 2023, the COA surveyed each of the 170 buildings for the presence of shared space and specific information relevant to the formation of a future NORC Program. The survey is now complete and will be available on our website this year.
The NORC Innovation Centre is the leading research-based voice of the NORC movement. It articulates the potential of NORCs to bring health, social and physical supports/services to where high numbers of older adults already live. It is currently lobbying the provincial and federal governments to provide sustainable funding for NORC programming across Canada. Some interesting reports are contained on its website (see below).
It takes a village of determined citizens, community organizations, researchers and politicians working together to secure sustainable funding for NORC Support Programs. The COA is proud to be a leading player in the NORC movement. We support and applaud the NORC Innovation Centre’s mission to “design the future of aging in place by unleashing the power of NORCs.”
For More Information
- COA Fact Sheet: NORC-SSPs: An Innovative Supportive Housing Model for Older Adults: coaottawa.ca/2022/02/02/norc-ssps-an-innovative-supportive-housing-model-for-older-adults/
- Ottawa NORC finder map: neighbourhoodstudy.ca/norcs
- The NORC Innovation Centre: norcinnovationcentre.ca
- The NORC Ambassador Program: norcambassadors.ca/program
- Oasis: www.oasis-aging-in-place.com
Jennifer Brooks is the outgoing Co-Chair of the COA Age-Friendly Housing Committee and the lead on the NORC Working Group. For references for this article, contact: jbroo613@gmail.com
