Increasing number of children being raised by grandparents
‘Skip-generation’ families press grandparents into service
TORONTO — With their only child grown up with a family of her own, Louise Hutchison and Dave Sharp were enjoying the freedom of being empty nesters: travelling, getting together with friends and, of course, visiting with their grandchildren.
But three years ago, the Alberta couple’s lives changed dramatically when they went from being grandparents to full-time caregivers of their three young granddaughters after their mother was charged with impaired driving and disappeared from her children’s lives.
“It wasn’t what we were planning, because we had been through it,” Hutchison conceded in an interview from her home in Airdrie, near Calgary. “We went from an empty nest to a full house again.
“It was actually fun being the grandparents because we could take them and we could have a lot of fun with them,” Hutchison, who works as a company manager, said of her granddaughters Coralynn, 9, Riley, 6, and Hayleigh, almost 4.
“And we now have to be more the parents. It’s just not the same, right?”
The couple and the girls are what’s known as a skip-generation family, a phenomenon that’s on the rise in Canada as households depart from the traditional two-parent configuration in favour of other caregivers, such as grandparents, step-parents or other siblings.
In new 2016 census figures released Wednesday, Statistics Canada said three in 10 Canadian children — 30.3 per cent — were living in either a loneparent family, a stepfamily or without both of their parents.
Of those, 32,520 children aged 14 and under across Canada were living exclusively with grandparents in 2016, up from 25,245 in 2001, the census found — an increase of about 29 per cent.
“A skip-generation family is where a grandparent is the primary adult in a child’s life, when no parent is present,” explained Nora Spinks, CEO of the Vanier Institute of the Family.
“And that parent may be absent because they’ve passed away, they may be somewhere else in the world or they may be incapable of parenting. So they might be experiencing mental illness or they might be incarcerated.”
Children living in a private household without their parents were most prevalent in the territories, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, Statistics Canada reported. Between three and six per cent of children 14 and younger were either living with grandparents, other relatives or as foster children in those regions in 2016, the numbers show.
“In that way, Kelowna is following a lot of Canadian trends,” said Basran.
“Kelowna is open, accepting and increasingly diverse, both in population and economy. Kelowna can be home for everyone.”
Basran is also happy to see the trend of young people staying here and moving here to go to college or university, and then sticking around to build a career and life.
“In the past, youth left Kelowna because there just weren’t the opportunities here,” he said.
“That’s changed. Economic opportunity combined with lifestyle keeps and attracts young people.”
The Okanagan Youth Collective is currently running two campaigns to let young people know Kelowna is the place to be to get an education, start or build a career, raise a family and have fun.
The Make It Here initiative sees the collective partner with industry groups or employers to provide information and support during worker recruitment.
How Does the Okanagan Compare is an electronic package and online tool that can be used by people thinking of moving to Kelowna.
It compares the cost of living in Kelowna to big markets where skilled workers are being targeted, such as Vancouver, Toronto and San Francisco.
Kelowna may now have an average price of $716,000 for a singlefamily home, but that’s less than
the $1.6 million in Vancouver and the $1 million in Toronto.
“I know of young professionals who’ve recently bought great houses in Kelowna for under $500,000,” said Vincent.
“And there is also the option to rent (which is also cheaper than the big cities).”
Millennials also like the idea of condominium and townhouse living, which in the past seemed the purview of baby boomers, empty nesters and retirees.
Young people like the low-maintenance lifestyle of condos and townhouses, that such housing tends to be close to downtown and amenities and it costs less, so they have money left over for recreation, entertainment and travel.
Of course, these trends have been noticed numerous times over the past five years, but the census release confirms what people have observed.
Most recently, a story by The Canadian Press lauded Kelowna for its tech surge, youth invasion, burgeoning restaurant and craft-brew scene, award-winning wines, revitalized downtown and abundance of recreation and watersports. The article was published in newspapers such as the National Post, Winnipeg Free Press Victoria Times Colonist, only further getting the word out that Kelowna’s not just a retirement city anymore.