Senior Active Living Center • Vefa Card • Our Gratitude to Them
Tatlısu owes what it is today to the labor of our elders. We will not be a municipality that remembers only on special occasions the people who worked this land, raised their children, and carried our town's roads, fields, culture and solidarity to the present day.
For us, gratitude is not a visit paid a few times a year; it is a municipal service that continues 365 days a year.
That is why we will build a new three-pillar model of social municipal service for Tatlısu's senior citizens: the Senior Active Living Center, the Vefa Card, and Our Gratitude to Them.
1Senior Active Living Center
Growing older does not mean withdrawing from life.
Rather than a traditional "seniors' club", we will give Tatlısu a modern Senior Active Living Center where our elders can carry on their lives without losing touch with social life. Our center will be a living space where people don't just sit and pass the time, but meet, create, learn, stay active and pass their experience on to younger generations.
- Social gathering and conversation areas
- Books, newspapers and a reading corner
- Chess, backgammon and traditional game areas
- Culture, arts and handicraft workshops
- Light exercise and active living activities
- Healthy aging seminars with expert speakers
- Periodic basic health check-ups
- Nutrition and healthy living briefings
- Digital literacy training
- Film and documentary screenings
- Music and cultural events
- Intergenerational gatherings
- Trips and social activities
Not Four Walls, but a Living Center.
The defining feature of the Senior Active Living Center will be that it runs on a program. With a monthly events calendar, we will create a place our elders look forward to — asking "What's on at the center today?" — a place they want to go, and a place where they feel they belong.
Because our aim is not to gather our people into a building, but to bind them more strongly to life.
2Vefa Card
We will offer Tatlısu's elders not privileges, but the recognition they deserve.
We will provide a free Vefa Card to Tatlısu residents who meet the age criteria we set. The Vefa Card will not be just a discount card. It will be the municipality's tangible way of telling its senior citizens: "I know you, I know your needs, and I am by your side."
The Vefa Card will bring special advantages at the municipality's social facilities and services.
- Markets and local shopping points
- Non-pharmacy health and personal care services
- Barbers and hairdressers
- Restaurants and cafés
- Local product sales points
- Social and cultural events
Voluntary agreements with local businesses will create special discounts and conveniences for Vefa Card holders. Cardholders will be able to access the municipality's social, cultural and support services for the elderly through a single system. In this way, the Vefa Card will also grow into a social support network that lets us keep track of our elders' needs.
3Our Gratitude to Them
When there is need, they will not knock on the municipality's door — the municipality will knock on theirs.
Our elders who live alone, have limited mobility or need support in daily life will be followed closely within the municipality's social services system.
- Home visits
- Identifying basic household needs
- Minor maintenance and repair support
- Access to hair and personal care services
- Referral to periodic health screenings
- Support with transport to hospitals and health services
- Staff assistance with municipal paperwork
- Transport to social events
- Regular contact with citizens who live alone
No one will have to wonder, "How do I reach the municipality?" When needed, the municipality will reach them.
Vefa Line
We are just a phone call away.
We will set up a Vefa Line within the municipality for Vefa Card holders and their families. Our elders or their relatives will be able to pass their needs to the municipality through a single point of contact. Every request will be logged, routed to the right department and followed through to a result. We will be the municipality that follows up — not the one you have to keep chasing.
Vefa Shuttle
Lack of transport will not be a reason to be cut off from social life.
We will create scheduled transport support for citizens who struggle to reach the Senior Active Living Center, municipal events and designated social activities. We will not allow our elders — especially those living alone without a car of their own — to drift away from social life.
Generations Meet
Experience will meet the young.
The Senior Active Living Center will not be a closed space used only by our older citizens. Through dedicated programs, our children and young people will come together with our elders. While the young lend a hand with technology and digital services, our elders will pass on Tatlısu's past, its traditions, its culture of production, its old trades and their life experience.
Tatlısu's Living Memory
People pass on; their stories remain.
As the cultural pillar of the Our Gratitude to Them program, we will build an Oral History and Living Memory Archive with Tatlısu's elders. Their childhoods, their stories of migration and settlement, Tatlısu's old way of life, its farming and production culture, its traditions, family stories, photographs, old belongings and local tales on the verge of being forgotten will all be recorded. These records will also become a core source for the future Tatlısu City/Memory Museum.
A Municipality That Remembers Your Birthday
Remembering is a service, too.
On their special days, the municipality will remember the elders registered in the Vefa system. Sometimes a phone call, sometimes a short visit, sometimes a flower… Because social municipal service is not only about asphalt, pavements and buildings. Helping people feel valued is also the municipality's job.
Vefa Table
We will gather around the same table.
From time to time, a Vefa Table will be set with our elders at the Senior Active Living Center. It will be about more than sharing a meal; there will be conversation, memories of the past, concerns listened to, and the municipal leadership meeting our elders face to face. The mayor and municipal managers will sit at this table regularly. Because we will remove the distance between those who govern and the citizen.
Our Understanding of Gratitude
We will not see our elderly as people whose doors we knock on only at election time. They are Tatlısu's living memory. Behind the roads we walk on, the trees we sit beneath, the culture we hold and the lives we have built stands their labor.
With the Senior Active Living Center, we will keep them at the heart of social life.
With the Vefa Card, we will make their daily lives easier.
With Our Gratitude to Them, we will be at their side whenever they need us.
With the Living Memory project, we will carry their stories into the future.
In Tatlısu, Gratitude Will Not Remain Words — It Will Become Service
Senior Active Living Center — Growing older together, without losing touch with life.
Vefa Card — Tatlısu's gratitude to Tatlısu's elders.
Our Gratitude to Them — By their side 365 days a year, not just one.
Vefa Line — Just a phone call away.
Living Memory — We will record their stories before the voices fall silent.
Yesterday they worked for us. Today it is our turn to repay our debt of gratitude.
