Team Portage la Prairie will have no less than two representatives at the upcoming international conference on aging in Montreal.

While Portage city Coun. Janet Shindle will attend the International Federation on Aging's ninth global conference, from Sept. 4-7, as the city's official representative, former mayor Ian MacKenzie will give a presentation there.

Shindle will attend the conference as a delegate, but said she wants to give as much as she takes away from it.

"I'm hoping we can contribute a bit to the conference," the councillor said.

Portage was selected by the Manitoba government to participate in the World Health Organization's global Age-Friendly Cities Project in April 2006. Representatives from 33 communities all over the world that participated in the study will get together prior to the actual conference at the Pre-Conference Workshop on Age-Friendly Communities to share the challenges and successes of creating more aging-friendly communities, Shindle explained.

"There will be a lot of info exchanged in that time period," she said.

In addition to the dialogue that will be exchanged by the representatives of the participating communities, each one will also have a poster on display depicting what has happened in their community since the study was done.

At the actual conference, Shindle is looking forward to getting a good idea of what is happening in other places around the world.

rswystun@cpheraldleader.com

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