On Wednesday, November 28th, Dillon Shewchuk, the City of Martensville Community/Economic Development Manager and D. James Leier with Preferred Development Strategies hosted an information session regarding Senior Housing and Care in Martensville. The event was held at the New Horizon’s Senior Centre and brought out approximately 30 local individuals that had much interest in the topic.
Currently, Martensville is far below the province’s average for seniors living in the community, has very few options for affordable housing and offers no care units to those requiring them. Today, according to information from the provincial health statistics, the community of 10,000 has approximately 445 residents that are 65 and over.
With a large number of young families moving to Martensville, it also brings with it more parents and grandparents wishing to move closer to their family. Also, Shewchuk noted that as resident’s age, it is important to provide housing options for them, so they are able to stay within the community.
Shewchuk discussed the positive impact that providing affordable senior housing and care would have for the community such as; opportunities for growth, economic spin-off, new resources for housing, and more.
The City of Martensville is working with Preferred Choice Development Strategies to develop a functional plan for senior housing, which will include data collection, assessing the current and future needs of local residents and creating a business plan to attract investors. “In the end, what we are going to have is a document that will define what housing and care should look like in Martensville,” Shewchuk said.
Leier then spoke regarding the population growth that Martensville has seen in recent years, and noted that, “projections based on current trends could have the city growing to between 17,000 and 25,000 people in the next two decades.”
Provincially, those aged 65+ make up approximately 15.5% of the population compared to Martensville, where those 65+ consist of 4.6% of the population. “If Martensville happened to have a similar population age distribution on the senior’s front of 65+ to that of Saskatchewan, then really, there would be another 1052 more seniors here. Compared to the level it is at right now, that would almost triple it. When you think of what the potential is for senior housing in town, there is a significant opportunity,” Leier explained.
