Vantaa builds wellbeing and is socially sustainable

Urban safety refers to the comprehensive safety of residents in everyday life, which is the basis for their wellbeing. Vantaa’s urban safety is guided by a safety plan. The realisation of safety and a sense of security requires cooperation between different operators, and it is affected by many factors, such as a safe living and working environment, equality among the population and traffic planning. Safety planning prevents various problems and creates resilience to cope with crises, which requires up-to-date information and safety management.

In Vantaa, safety challenges have in recent years been largely related to the pandemic and social exclusion. Domestic violence increased during the pandemic, as violent behaviour moved into the home, particularly affecting women and the most vulnerable groups. Violence and disruptive behaviour by young people have been on the rise. People are also concerned and feel unsafe because of substance abuse and drug trafficking. In Vantaa, cross-sectoral safety work focuses on intimate partner violence, substance abuse, youth and safe mobility. In addition, safety management and gender awareness are cross-cutting themes in safety work.

The safety plan includes measures from different departments related to the thematic focus areas of the plan. Often, the best way to prevent problems is to direct resources and development work to permanent operations and existing services. There have also been new initiatives, for example training professionals working with young people in the early recognition of and intervention in radicalisation and violent extremism.

One way in which Vantaa promotes the residents’ sense of security is by adopting safe space principles in all city premises. A safe space is one that offers those present a sense of physical, mental and social safety. The aim is to ensure that no one has to face any form of discrimination, bullying, harassment or violence. They are actively prevented, and situations where they occur are dealt with immediately. A safe space must also be reachable and accessible. Safe space principles include respect for others and giving everyone the space to be themselves. When implementing the principles, it is important to consider all the people who use the space and to plan the principles together with them.

The initiative to introduce safe space principles came from the work on the Child Friendly City Initiative. Children and young people spend a lot of time at city premises and events, so the safety of the premises and events is of key importance. However, the safety of the premises applies to all users. A space that is safe for children is safe for everyone.

Preventing and tackling bullying is an essential part of the work being done for the safety of children. Vantaa’s daycare centres, schools and other educational institutes actively prevent bullying and tackle situations of bullying at a low threshold. At the beginning of the 2022–2023 school year, a new action plan for preventing and tackling bullying was introduced in Vantaa schools. Every daycare centre, school and educational institute in Vantaa will specify the plan to suit its own activities. The action plan includes nine measures to prevent bullying and to tackle possible bullying situations.

Communal wellbeing is strengthened by supporting the participation of pupils in the planning and development of work on wellbeing. For example, pupils are encouraged to consider how everyone can feel good in school and how the classroom atmosphere can be improved. Vantaa also organises wellbeing-themed event days and weeks. In addition, some schools also use peer-to-peer mediation (Verso) and the Kiva bullying prevention method. A bullying prevention team is elected in each school to work actively on bullying prevention and early intervention in bullying.

Experiences of sexual harassment have increased among pupils in lower secondary school (the final level of comprehensive school) and students at upper secondary level. As sexual harassment has also been discussed much more in Finland in recent years than before, it is possible that today’s young people are better able to identify inappropriate behaviour, which contributes to the higher figures. However, it is important to pay more attention to preventing and tackling harassment. As in the case of bullying, prevention of sexual harassment is largely related to strengthening a good and trusting atmosphere in schools. Sexuality education also plays an important role in helping children and young people to recognise and articulate when they encounter harassment. Recognising personal boundaries and respecting others is an important part of sexuality education. Vantaa also pays attention to preventing and tackling bullying, safety skills and holistic sexuality education in early childhood education.

Safety is linked to good governance, municipal democracy and inclusion. In May 2022, the Vantaa City Council approved ethical principles for appointed and elected officials. The aim of the ethical principles is to ensure high-quality municipal administration, the trust of local residents in decision-making, and equal treatment of both officials and local residents in official activities. The principles also apply to relations between appointed/elected officials and city employees.

The starting point for the activities of appointed and elected officials is appropriate, equal and respectful behaviour. The goal is a safe space where everyone can safely participate in the official activities as themselves without fear of inappropriate treatment or harassment. There is zero tolerance for inappropriate treatment.

Political debate involves differences of opinions and opposing, sometimes even pointed, views. Nevertheless, everyone must treat others with respect and dignity. Things can be debated and many different views held without offending anyone. Nobody should tolerate inappropriate behaviour from others. If someone feels that they have been treated inappropriately, the matter must be investigated so that a good atmosphere between the officials can be restored and joint activities continued in an appropriate and respectful manner.

When Vantaa was selected as Europe’s Rising Innovative City in 2021, the city decided to use €300,000 of the prize money to enable new innovations through an innovation competition. In 2022, an Urban Innovations of All Sizes innovation competition was organised, inviting local residents, companies, NGOs and associations to come up with new ideas in the categories of thriving city centres, good everyday services and combatting climate change. Fifteen of the 174 entries submitted were selected for funding. The participants whose ideas will be funded will implement these social innovations of different types and sizes during 2023. The next innovation competition will be held in 2024.

Since 2021, the City of Vantaa has encouraged residents to participate in the development of residential areas through participatory budgeting. Participatory budgeting is a method of interaction between residents, where residents have the opportunity to decide on the use a certain amount of city funds for and participate in planning and decision-making. Residents get a genuine feeling of inclusion, their opinions are heard and their influence leads to concrete actions, which increases wellbeing, sense of community and the comfort of areas.

Participatory budgeting has been used in Vantaa to reduce the welfare disparities between areas and residents in several projects that have sought to reach diverse groups of residents and inspire them in the participation process. There is also cooperation with local actors, such as NGOs, libraries, schools, daycare centres and youth centres. Participatory budgeting will be extended to the entire city in 2023.

Participatory budgeting is implemented through the Committed Vantaa service at OsallistuvaVantaa.fi, which brings together current opportunities for participation and influence in one place. The platform serves as a good channel for interaction between the city and residents, as the service can be used to publish surveys, organise online discussions and communicate about the progress of projects. On the website, residents can familiarise themselves with and participate in projects, plans and the development of residential areas in Vantaa.

The development of Vantaa residents’ opportunities for participation and influence is guided by the Committed Vantaa programme 2022–2025. The implementation of the programme is coordinated by a cross-departmental working group. Personnel are supported by the Inclusion Services team, which develops and maintains various methods of inclusion, such as resident panels, dialogue methods, an online inclusion environment and participatory budgeting. In addition, Inclusion Services organises training and networking activities for personnel.

Vantaa residents’ feeling of inclusion and satisfaction with opportunities to participate and influence things are monitored through an annual survey.  The results of the survey conducted at the turn of the year 2021–2022 show that Vantaa residents’ feeling of inclusion had strengthened since the previous annual survey to an average inclusion indicator rating of 78.4. Satisfaction with opportunities for participation and influence had increased slightly; 36% of the respondents were somewhat or very satisfied with them.

In the 2022 county elections, Vantaa had the lowest voter turnout in the country at only 38.1%, which is significantly lower than in other previous elections. In particular, the turnout of foreign-language voters was low, and there were significant differences in voter turnout between different areas in Vantaa. Voting is a very important form of participation, and the low turnout is worrying in terms of democratisation. The central election boards of municipalities and cities are responsible for organising elections, and their task is to ensure that elections are conducted legally and are independent. It is important to ensure that all persons entitled to vote feel that voting is genuinely possible.

Vantaa wanted to determine what factors are behind the declining voter turnout, how voter turnout is distributed regionally and demographically, and why some Vantaa residents have abstained from voting. A study was carried out on the subject, making use of Statistics Finland’s register and survey data.

The study showed that the nomination of candidates plays an important role in voting or abstaining and that people often abstained because they could not find a suitable candidate. In addition, there were shortcomings in access to information; not all foreign-language speakers, in particular, knew whether they were entitled to vote or had been provided with sufficient information on what the elections were about. If more foreign-language speakers stand as candidates, it also promotes the voter turnout of foreign-language speakers. If there are foreign-language speakers among election officials, information will also spread to different communities through them.

In the spring of 2023, parliamentary elections were held in Finland, and Vantaa planned various measures to increase voter turnout. Vantaa drew up its own Government Programme goals, which were presented and promoted together with Vantaa candidates at four ‘Vantaudu vaaleille’ voting promotion events in February and March. The plan was to take the events to the places that people already frequented. Vantaa also carried out a voter activation campaign, in which information was provided at residential areas by means of an election car. The elections were announced actively and in as many languages as possible. Vantaa works in close cooperation with various immigrant organisations, and elections were also be announced at their events.

The study showed that the placement of advance polling stations in places that residents frequent has an impact on voter turnout. Voting must be easy and effortless so that as many undecided voters as possible decide to vote. The advance polling stations in Vantaa are located in different parts of the city, along good public transport connections and in the vicinity of services in residential areas.

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child is in force in Finland as a statutory instrument, i.e. it obliges everyone operating in the municipal sector. The City of Vantaa is committed to increasing the consideration of children, and Vantaa applied for and was accepted into UNICEF’s Child Friendly Cities Initiative (CFCI) in 2021. CFCI is a tool provided by UNICEF that helps cities to make the right decisions for the wellbeing of children and to ensure that the rights of the child are implemented as well as possible in the everyday life of every child, including those in a vulnerable position.

Vantaa’s CFCI activities started with a survey of the current state of affairs that consulted a large number of the city’s employees, partners and Vantaa residents, especially children and young people. Based on the survey, a Child Friendly City action plan was prepared, and the City Board approved it in December 2021. The action plan contains five goals and 14 measures. The measures include developing peer-to-peer communication for children and young people, increasing children and young people’s interaction with leaders and decision-makers, introducing safe space principles, and increasing the knowledge of staff and appointed and elected officials about children’s rights. If Vantaa succeeds in achieving its goals and promoting the rights of the child in the city, it will receive the recognition of a Child Friendly City in 2024.

Knowledge-based management, i.e. systematically collected information and its utilisation at all levels of operations, is of paramount importance in promoting wellbeing. In particular, experiential knowledge collected from local residents is a valuable source of information in the development of services and decision-making. The School Health Promotion study conducted by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare every two years compiles data on the wellbeing, health and inclusion of school-age children and young people in secondary education. The longitudinal study enables long-term monitoring and comparisons of Vantaa’s results with other regions and national results. In addition, the responses of children and young people living in Vantaa can be examined by gender and origin. The results of Vantaa’s School Health Promotion study are collected in the Power BI platform, which is open to all. At national and municipal level, there is very little systematic information on the wellbeing of children under school age. This will be improved once the National Institute for Health and Welfare compiles the FinLapset survey data from school-age children and their guardians in 2024.

The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the wellbeing of children and young people can be seen in the results of the School Health Promotion study. Children and young people are experiencing widespread anxiety and fatigue, and the situation of girls shows particularly worrying developments. The pandemic has caused a backlog in care as well as a learning deficit, and the transition to distance education had a negative impact on the wellbeing and education of many young people. The challenges have been met by increasing the resources of mental health services for children and young people and of specialised youth work, for example.

Youth work has identified the need to get a real-time picture of the wellbeing of young people in different areas. SOS Children’s Village has launched a project to build a data collection model for regional youth work for Vantaa Youth Services. The model under development is based on highlighting young people’s experiences and perspectives, and it is being built together with young people using the means of service design. 

In addition to the pandemic, the situation of many families has been made more difficult by the rise in food and energy prices. Child poverty, that is, the share of children under the age of 18 living in low-income households, had already risen slightly compared to previous years according to data from 2021. The poverty of families with children is a complex phenomenon with various consequences for the wellbeing, health and inclusion of children and young people. The wellbeing of the whole family is central to the wellbeing of children, and inequality during childhood also has far-reaching effects on the child’s entire future. In Vantaa, more attention should be paid to the poverty of families with children, its causes and consequences.

In cooperation between the City of Vantaa and the new wellbeing services county, services for families have been developed to make it easier for residents to receive different services on a one-stop shop basis. A family centre operating model is being developed to bring together services used by families, such as child health clinics and mental health services, as well as open meeting places in the same building. The model will intensify cooperation between different actors, and NGOs have been involved in the development work. The aim is to make low-threshold services easily accessible to everyone. The first family centre will be established at the Koivukylä open meeting point in Eastern Vantaa, and the next one is being planned for Myyrmäki in Western Vantaa. Within the framework of the operating model, multi-professional family centre teams will be piloted to be able to respond comprehensively to the service needs of families. In the future, the operations will also include the lending of equipment to families with neuropsychiatric spectrum disorders and the implementation of mental health support methods in local NGOs.

The inclusion and wellbeing of children and young people are also being developed in Vantaa through leisure activities. Vantaa wants to offer every child opportunities to have a hobby, regardless of the family’s situation. Supporting leisure activities promotes children’s wellbeing, inclusion and equality, as they can help children find a community and reduce the risk of social exclusion. Harrastusten Vantaa (Vantaa Offers Leisure Activities) is a project that offers comprehensive school pupils in Vantaa equal opportunities to participate in free recreational activities of their preference near their schools and homes. The activities are part of the Finnish Model for Leisure Activities, which combines listening to children and young people’s wishes about leisure activities, the coordination of existing good practices and operating methods, and cooperation between schools and activity service providers. In 2023, the model will be established in the Youth Act.

In Vantaa, leisure activities are organised based on requests from children and young people collected through various surveys. To ensure that as many children as possible can benefit from the available activities, more attention will be paid to communication channels and multilingualism in future. In particular, it has been challenging to encourage pupils in lower secondary school to participate in leisure activities.

The Tempo Orchestra, which started its operations in Vantaa in 2009, enables music activities at a low threshold. The orchestra was launched by the Vantaa Music Institute at Länsimäki Comprehensive School and Kytöpuisto Primary School. Over the years, leisure activities in the Tempo Orchestra have become an established part of the everyday life of schoolchildren and a valuable addition to the educational work of comprehensive schools. The activities are currently offered at six different schools all over Vantaa.

The Tempo Orchestra strengthens the sense of community between young people from different backgrounds. There are no entrance exams for the orchestra, and both the instruction and instruments are provided free of charge. School teachers help the orchestra find young people who will particularly benefit from the activities. Instruction is provided by qualified teachers familiar with the Tempo Orchestra’s operating methods. Schools from areas where low-threshold recreational opportunities have been asked for are involved in the activities. Playing in the Tempo Orchestra has developed friendships and strengthened pupils’ social skills and motivation to attend school.

Finnish early childhood education and primary and lower secondary education are committed to the principles of inclusion. Inclusion means that all children have the right to early and appropriate support and the realisation of their right to learn as part of a group. Early and appropriate support has a long-lasting positive impact on children’s learning. There has been much public debate in Finland recently about the challenges of inclusion in schools, and the realisation of inclusion does require continuous work by both teachers and the entire work community in early childhood education and schools. In Vantaa, the shared commitment to the principles of inclusion and effective early support are developed, for example, by strengthening staff competence and multi-professional cooperation and by developing the targeting and effectiveness of support.

As part of a package that supports the principles of inclusion, Vantaa’s early childhood education has introduced the ProVaka model for supporting social skills by developing the operating culture of daycare centres, which is a long-term training and guidance package for early childhood education staff. According to studies and Vantaa’s own assessments, the most common support needs of children are related to lacking social and emotional skills, such as difficulties in self-regulation and defiant or aggressive behaviour. It is in these areas that deficiencies in Finnish early childhood education have been identified, and support should be provided more systematically. ProVaka strengthens the competence of staff so that they are better able to support children’s social and emotional skills. In this way, it contributes to a more effective and thorough incorporation of the principles of inclusion into the core activities and operational culture of early childhood education.

Since 2019, four school social workers have been working in Vantaa’s early childhood education teamed up with psychologists to support parents, children and daycare staff. Providing early support helps prevent the problems of children and families from growing worse. The operating model aims particularly to reach the families that have difficulty seeking help through other channels. For example, language can be a barrier to getting help, and more than half of the clients of the school social workers speak a language other than Finnish as their native language. The effectiveness of the service has been monitored through regular surveys. Customers feel that they have received support in parenting, confidence in their own abilities as parents and means for dealing with their child in challenging situations. The staff of daycare centres have received multi-professional support in their own work and in addressing issues with parents.

Regional segregation, which Vantaa is striving to prevent through measures such as the ‘Vantaa is socially sustainable’ programme, also poses challenges to daycare centres and schools and undermines the realisation of equality. Vantaa applied for and was granted the state’s equality funding, which is being directed to different units to support education according to certain criteria related to the population of the region to reduce the effects of segregation. For example, the funding has been used to hire transversal special education teachers for transitional stages, resource teachers, assistants and multilingual counsellors. The aim is to curb the increase in segregation with the help of a model that reduces school segregation, which is being developed in the Shared School (Yhteinen koulu) project. The project aims to create permanent structures for cooperation between the city’s various departments in order to address the multidimensional challenge of segregation in the long term.

Vantaa is the most international city in Finland, and about 23% of the residents of the municipality have a foreign mother tongue. The foreign-language population is considerably younger than the Finnish-speaking population, which is reflected in the schools and early childhood education in Vantaa. Approximately 28% of the pupils study Finnish and literature as a second language in separate groups. In Finland, there has recently been some debate about the suitability of these groups for pupils who have a good command of the Finnish language and could participate in the regular mother tongue instruction. There are plans to better specify and guide the selection of the curriculum in Vantaa. The language awareness of all teachers will be increased, for example by means of a network of language awareness officers. The largest language groups in Vantaa’s schools are Russian, Estonian, Arabic, Somali and Albanian, and more than 30 different languages are studied in Vantaa in native language instruction complementing primary and lower secondary education.

Studies show that the learning outcomes and wellbeing of foreign-language pupils in comprehensive school are lower than average, and multilingual counsellors have been hired in Vantaa to support them since 2020. The counsellors support pupils in planning their studies, transition phases, goal setting and emotional and interaction skills. They also support families and cooperate with other parties that offer services to young people. The work carried out by the counsellors strengthens the important role of the school in supporting integration and improves cooperation between schools and families. The feedback on the work of the counsellors has been positive from schools, families and pupils alike, and the job description will be further developed to better meet the needs.

Cooperation between families and schools and the wellbeing of pupils have also been developed in the Engaging School Community Work (SKY) project coordinated by the Ministry of Education and Culture, in which Vantaa is participating. The aim of the project is to create an operating model that supports pupils’ engagement in the school community and reduces absenteeism. The project has piloted the teaching of emotional and interpersonal skills to pupils in lower secondary school and giving additional training related to emotional skills and positive pedagogy to teachers, and has also supported schools’ operating models against bullying. A model for addressing absenteeism has been planned and implemented at the city level.

Long-term cooperation has been carried out in Vantaa for years in connection with the transition from comprehensive school to upper secondary education. New preparatory training for education leading to a degree was launched nationwide in 2022, and has started well in Vantaa. Case manager activities have been developed in cooperation between youth services and in basic and secondary education, giving certain young people long-term support through the transition period. Information transfer between basic education (primary and lower secondary education) and upper secondary education has been intensified in Vantaa, and is being developed further. Practices related to information transfer should also be developed nationally in the future. Supporting study paths for students with disabilities has also been identified as a challenge; Vantaa has no study opportunities for them, and the provision in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area is not sufficient for their needs.

Cooperation between different parties has also been intensified at secondary education institutions. At Vantaa Vocational College Varia, concerns about high drop-out rates highlighted the need for youth workers on the premises of the educational institute. The operating model, which includes cooperation between the school and youth services, was first developed in a project aimed to reduce the drop-out rate (Keskeyttämisestä kohtaamiseen) project and was made permanent in 2022. A total of eight youth workers work at Varia’s various locations, focusing in particular on identifying, supporting and increasing the wellbeing of students at risk of dropping out. Cooperation between comprehensive school and Varia has also been intensified in this context.

In 2021–2022, in cooperation with Annie Advisor Oy, Varia developed and piloted the Annie bot, which provides students with low-threshold support by sending them regular text messages and asking about their need for support. Depending on the nature of the support needed, the bot will direct the student to the right contact person. Varia has seen a significant decrease in the drop-out rate since the service was introduced. The feedback from students has been positive; they have felt that the bot has lowered the threshold for asking for help with various problems, which has helped keep them on track in their studies. Students’ wellbeing and ability to cope is enhanced by the knowledge that they are cared about and that support and help are available.

The labour shortage poses major challenges in early childhood education, where unfilled vacancies, non-qualified teachers and special needs teachers already account for 47% of vacancies, compared to 34% in 2021. The shortage poses many challenges in the everyday life of daycare centres; in the worst case scenario, the operating hours of daycare centres may need to be limited. This situation weakens the prerequisites for conducting high-quality early childhood education and has a negative impact on employees’ ability to cope at work. An availability working group established for early childhood education in the autumn of 2022 has planned and implemented various measures to increase staff attraction and retention. The measures include open recruitment, the development of recruitment marketing and competence of existing personnel, qualification paths, for example through apprenticeships, increasing the number of trainee positions and the development of practical training. It is also important to pay attention to the employees’ ability to cope and wellbeing at work.

Youth work faces major challenges in the availability of labour despite active recruitment. Nearly one third of youth work vacancies have not been filled. Various arrangements have been made to hire unqualified youth workers and hourly workers to fill the labour shortage. In spite of this, the city has been forced to reduce the opening hours of youth facilities, close facilities for fixed periods of time and reduce the amount of outreach youth work due to the serious labour shortage.

The shortage of skilled workers also brings challenges to several services that transferred from the City of Vantaa’s sustainability to the Vantaa and Kerava Wellbeing Services County at the beginning of 2023. In child welfare services, the shortage of skilled social workers brings major challenges and causes long queues in accessing services. The wellbeing services county will continue the development work started by the City of Vantaa in terms of process and management development and the wellbeing at work of the personnel.

In the services supporting families, which were also transferred to the wellbeing services county, the challenges in the availability of personnel are reflected in the occupational groups of psychologists, social workers and physicians, in particular. The shortage has been partly compensated for by outsourcing services or temporary agency work, but this is not possible for all positions. The challenges of staff availability have been reflected in delays in access to services, especially in family counselling services and the services of child welfare supervisors. Processes and services are being continuously developed to meet clients’ service needs despite the challenges posed by the labour shortages.

For the city to be able to support the wellbeing of the residents effectively in the future, it needs to have up-to-date information. The prerequisites for knowledge-based management in Vantaa have partly deteriorated since the start of the wellbeing services counties because the Healthy Finland survey of the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), which measures the wellbeing of the adult population in a broad manner, will only provide Vantaa with information at the level of the wellbeing services county in future. The city’s decision not to order municipality-specific information on the survey results weakens the knowledge base on the basis of which measures and development work will be planned and managed with regard to the wellbeing of the adult population.

A sense of community is an integral part of wellbeing, and cities play an important role in creating a public space where a sense of community is created and promoted. Such spaces include libraries and community centres, which play a diverse and significant role in supporting wellbeing.

Libraries support the continuous learning of all residents and equal opportunities for education and culture. They also promote a broad sense of community and a circular and sharing economy, not only through their core activity of lending books but also by offering various services and meetings. Vantaa has an extensive library network of 11 libraries throughout the city. In addition, a mobile library circulates in areas that do not have their own library. The libraries offer residents a variety of facilities and shared computers. In addition to borrowing books, the libraries have piloted the lending of many other items and, in 2022, the selection was expanded to include rubbish pickers, energy meters, entrance tickets, season tickets, and much more.

The libraries are important meeting places for Vantaa residents, and they organise various activities that increase the sense of community for people of all ages. Activities have been planned together with young people, and four libraries have started offering club activities for children and young people. Book clubs have been organised for adults, such as the Climate Reading Circle in 2022, as well as language cafés and communal language learning activities. Volunteers have delivered books to elderly people at home, organised various clubs and provided digital support, and the libraries also cooperate with NGOs.

Opportunities for different activities and a sense of community are also offered in Vantaa by community centres, spaces shared by residents and open to all that host a lot of activities organised by, for example, NGOs and volunteers. Community centres reduce loneliness and exclusion and offer opportunities for participation. They increase the sense of community and connections between residents, different communities and the city. In recent years, several new community centres have been established in Vantaa. For example, a former library in Koivukylä was renovated into a community centre that offers opportunities for recreational and volunteer activities. The Koivukylä community centre also hosts community meals within the framework of the Shared Table network, which provides waste food assistance.

After the start of the war in Ukraine, an assistance centre was established at the Koivukylä community centre together with the Mannerheim League for Child Welfare. The assistance centre provides support, advice and material assistance to Ukrainian refugees. Employees of the City of Vantaa and the Uusimaa District of the Mannerheim League for Child Welfare works at the assistance centre. Other NGOs and companies are also involved. The assistance centre hosts a variety of activities, and people can go there to spend time, have a coffee and chat with others in similar situations. There is a playground for children with Ukrainian or Russian-speaking volunteers present.

Vantaa promotes the health and wellbeing of its residents by creating various client-oriented services and making them easily available. Wellbeing mentoring, which started in Vantaa in 2020, is a free lifestyle guidance service intended mainly for Vantaa residents over the age of 18. The service aims at permanent lifestyle changes and improving health habits in a client-oriented manner. The service includes regular guidance meetings with the mentor and a health-related mobile application. The programme has achieved significant lifestyle changes and cost savings in healthcare expenditure.

Oral healthcare organised various low-threshold resident events during 2020–2022 with the aim of finding residents who had a great need for oral health care but did not seek out such services on their own. They were referred to oral health care services and self-treatment for oral health. Another aim was to increase residents’ interest in and taking responsibility for their own wellbeing and understanding of the effects of their actions on health.

The low-threshold service was offered to residents at familiar locations, such as open meeting places, youth centres, libraries, neighbourhood clubs and community centres.  Pop-up centres provided an individualised assessment of the need for care for people different ages. A total of 162 group events were held during the project between 2020 and 2022, with more than 3,000 people of different ages participating. In addition, over 8,000 children and young people were reached at a summer food event. More than 500 assessments of the need for care and further appointments were made. The operating model has been integrated into practice as part of the operations of open meeting points and other low-threshold locations, and it will also be continued now that responsibility for oral health care has been transferred to the Vantaa and Kerava Wellbeing Services County.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the sports service module launched a new digital service, virtual exercise sessions, in November 2020. The service is open to all and free of charge, and its use does not require a login. The virtual exercise sessions have played a very important role in the continuation of physical exercise – this was especially true for the elderly during the pandemic years. In addition to physical exercise, the virtual exercise sessions promote a feeling of inclusion. In 2020–2021, the sessions had thousands of users each month, at most almost 30,000 completed exercise sessions per month. The virtual exercise sessions are still available for everyone at Vantaa.fi. The website has a large number of recordings and a few weekly live streams.

Vantaa aims to promote the services and wellbeing for the elderly in a comprehensive and preventive manner. In Finland, the ageing of the population will significantly change the structures of society, and the trend will only accelerate in the coming years. A lot of attention must be paid to the wellbeing and full inclusion of older people.

Age-friendly Vantaa is a vision of a city where every older person can lead a good life according to their preferences. In September 2021, the City of Vantaa joined the WHO’s Age-Friendly Cities and Communities network of 1,363 cities from 47 countries working to improve and promote the living conditions of the elderly population. Vantaa’s goal is to promote and develop age-friendly urban construction, accessible services and civil society activities in all aspects of the planning, preparation, decision-making, implementation and monitoring of the city’s and wellbeing services county’s operations.

One of the objectives of the Vantaa Welfare Plan for the Elderly for 2018–2022 was to prevent the exclusion of the elderly, for example by means of outreach work. The MEK Focal Points – outreach work for the elderly project started in 2020 with the aim of creating a model for outreach work for the elderly in Vantaa, finding older people in need of help, developing services for them and supporting meaningful and dignified living at home. The project reached 130 older people at risk of social exclusion or loneliness and supported them in taking control of their own lives. The project launched groups to provide free and continuous activities, support and help for elderly substance abusers in their daily lives. Outreach work with older people supports their independence and increases their wellbeing. Since the project, the work is being continued by the wellbeing services county, and the development of operations will continue within the framework of the Good Age (Hyvä ikä) project, in cooperation with the wellbeing services county, cities and NGOs.

When it comes to poverty and inequality, as well as overall wellbeing, the importance of one’s own home is immeasurable. Homelessness has been reduced in Finland using the Housing First principle, where housing is seen as a fundamental right and basis for, not a consequence of, solving the person’s life management problems. Finland aims to halve homelessness by 2023 and eradicate it completely by 2027. To achieve this goal, a cooperative programme to halve homelessness has been launched with key city regions, service providers and NGOs.

Vantaa is constantly working to eradicate homelessness. In 2021, more emergency accommodation places were added and the Homelessness Prevention Project (Asunnottomuuden ehkäisyhanke) was launched. The Homelessness Prevention Project develops services for the most vulnerable and those in need of multidisciplinary and extensive support, mainly the homeless population and those at risk of homelessness in Vantaa.

The project is developing a multi-professional working method that combines healthcare and social welfare expertise and expertise through experience. The team conducts outreach work with the target group on the streets and on the premises of partners, providing multi-professional service guidance and advice. The aim of the activities is to ensure that clients get access to the necessary services and to support them in resolving their housing situation.

A team consisting of a nurse and a social worker is developing multidisciplinary cooperation in the handling of issues concerning homeless target groups and is creating a model for client-oriented and need-based housing consultation. Between February 2021 and September 2022, the outreach team reached 118 people in the project, 39 of whom received housing and 22 of whom gained access to supported housing services. In addition, a solution was found to the homelessness of seven people. In 2022, housing consultation organised a walk-in event attended by 35 clients, 15 of whom received housing and four were helped to retain their housing.

The number of homeless people in Vantaa was 227 in 2020 and 219 in 2021, but in 2022 the number rose sharply to 291. This change is partly explained by the fact that the Homelessness Prevention Project’s outreach work also reaches clients who were previously not known to be homeless and who were newly recorded in the statistics and services. Homelessness data has also been compiled more carefully. Long-term homelessness has continued to decline in Vantaa, but short-term homelessness has probably increased despite statistical perspectives. The service backlog in health and social services due to the pandemic and the rise in prices affect this development and further weaken the position of vulnerable groups.

Inclusion and a sense of community are an integral part of wellbeing, and they can also be combined with other SDGs, such as Reduced Poverty, Zero Hunger and Climate Action. These perspectives are combined in the Shared Table activities, which combines food security with reducing food waste and community activities. In Finland, food consumption accounts for an average of 20–25% of a consumer’s climate impact. Approximately 650 million kg of food waste are generated in Finland each year, approximately half of which is wasted food. The Vantaa Shared Table network combats food waste by donating it to residents in need of food aid. The network employs long-term unemployed persons and volunteers in logistics, kitchen and storage duties.

Shared Table is a model of food waste utilisation and communal food assistance developed in Vantaa that brings together city operators, the church, the third sector and educational institutes to make use of edible food waste. The network includes more than 50 active donors of food waste (wholesalers, grocery shops, food factories) and 86 NGOs that distribute food aid in different ways. Lutheran parishes and other churches are also involved. Approximately 5,500 people benefit from the food aid every week.

The heart of the operations is a food waste terminal established by the City of Vantaa. The amount of food waste passing through the terminal has decreased sharply since the beginning of the war in Ukraine in 2022, from about 14,000 kg per week to 10,000 kg per week. The reason for this is the decrease in waste generated by food factories. At the same time, the effects of pandemic and the rise in food prices have been reflected in the need for food aid, although not in perfectly straightforward ways. The need for food aid has increased and, on the other hand, some elderly people stopped visiting food aid services during the pandemic, which is concerning. Most of the recipients of food aid are older people, especially women.