![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Screenshot-2026-04-14-225705-1024x585.png\")
\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\nA new report is providing a closer look at the homeless population across Metro Vancouver.<\/p>\n
One growing and concerning demographic: seniors.<\/p>\n
According to the report, seniors make up 18 per cent of the current homeless population in Vancouver.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe routinely have people in their mid to late 70s, sometimes early 80s, and it requires a lot of adjustments from our staff, but we are working to provide the care they need,\u201d said Nick Wells with the Union Gospel Mission.<\/p>\n
He adds that the rise in seniors experiencing homelessness noted in the report is definitely reflected in their shelters.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince the pandemic, we have really seen a spike in the number of seniors turning to our shelter services, and right now it\u2019s about 30 to 33 per cent,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cRight now, a third of our shelter population is people over the age of 55. Those numbers are growing at about 2 per cent every year. It\u2019s a real serious ongoing issue that I think can get lost in the shuffle sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wells says that 10 years ago, if one was over 40, outreach workers would consider that an \u201colder age,\u201d but that has since changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur current oldest shelter resident is 78 years old; we have people in their 80s, in one case, we had a dementia diagnosis.\u201d<\/p>\n
Forty per cent of unhoused seniors say that they first experienced homelessness after the age of 55.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that seniors are a growing cohort of unhoused folk and are struggling under the severe affordability issues in the City of Vancouver, not just rent but inflationary pressures, which is creating a whole new wave of unhoused folks being left behind in our city,\u201d said Coun. Pete Fry.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt does speak to the need for more appropriate inventions, and we need to get ahead of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The city is calling on the provincial and federal governments to increase investments in income assistance and recommit to establishing a homeless navigation centre, which was promised by the province in 2020, but has yet to be built.<\/p>\n
CityNews reached out to the province for an update on the centre, but did not hear back in time for the broadcast deadline.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\tMore seniors experiencing homelessness across Metro Vancouver. (CityNews) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A new report is providing a closer look at the homeless population across Metro Vancouver. One growing and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":605207,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194298],"tags":[49,48,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-605206","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vancouver","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-vancouver"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=605206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605206\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/605207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=605206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=605206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=605206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}