Living Together 2025: Connecting housing, social health and resilience

This symposium is officially sold out!

Living Together 2025: Connecting housing, social health and resilience is a two-day ‘collective action’ symposium that will convene 150+ housing experts, public health professionals, municipal planners, architects, place-based community organizations, emergency management professionals, senior government policymakers, academics, and students. 

Together, we’ll celebrate successes, share learnings and identify opportunities to move closer to a future where more of Canada’s multi-unit housing communities are age-friendly, socially connected, neighbourly, health-promoting and resilient.

The two-day event will touch on diverse but overlapping topics (more detailed agenda coming soon):

• Creating stronger conditions for aging in place in multi-unit housing;
• Strengthening neighbourly social connections and mutual support to prepare for and withstand stresses and climate-related emergencies; 
• Best practices for designing socially connected, age-friendly, resilient multi-unit housing;
• Aligning health and housing sectors to support systems and policy change;
• Exploring the integration of nature-based solutions as social connection infrastructure in multi-unit housing retrofits and redevelopments, and more.

Context

Nationally and internationally, social isolation and loneliness are a growing concern – in 2023, the U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, released an advisory titled “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” calling for significant efforts to strengthen social connections. And in November 2023, the World Health Organization announced a new Commission on Social Connection, recognizing social isolation and loneliness as a primary public health and policy concern. As Dr. Holt-Lundstad, a leading global expert on the health impacts of social isolation, emphasized, “we need to prioritize our social relationships like our life depends on it, because it does.” 

While Canada has yet to introduce a national strategy to combat social isolation and loneliness, many local and regional organizations, including Hey Neighbour Collective’s partners, are actively championing such initiatives. However, social isolation is only one part of a broader “poly-crisis” that also includes (amongst others) housing unaffordability, climate change, extreme weather events, and a lack of supports for our aging population. 

In addressing these interconnected crises, why not start at home? Our social connections, particularly with our neighbours, represent one of our most important resources. As Canada continues to prioritize building denser housing types, we are presented with a unique opportunity to leverage multi-unit housing environments to foster social connectedness, prepare for and withstand emergencies, and support better conditions for aging in place.

Call for sponsors

If your organization would like to learn about sponsorship opportunities, please visit the PDF linked below, and email mhoar@sfu.ca.

Thank you to our co-hosts, sponsors and funders

Session co-hosts

Gold sponsor

Silver sponsor

Bronze sponsors

Funders

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