Housing Support for Holocaust Survivors: Polina’s Story

Polina Gruzinov has spent much of her life searching for a home to call her own.

Her story, shared by Tikva in the Jewish Independent, begins in 1939 in Ukraine, where she was just two years old when her family fled advancing Nazi forces — the first of many displacements that would define her early life. Gruzinov spent decades bouncing between cramped, unstable homes across the Soviet Union, Central Asia, and Israel. Even after moving to Canada in 2016 to be closer to her daughter, Vancouver's rental market kept her squeezed into tight quarters. Then in 2017, Tikva Housing gave her something no one could take away: her very own apartment, with her daughter conveniently right down the hall.

At 87, Gruzinov is proud to be living independently. “I have always dreamed of having a place of my own,” she said.

Pictured: Lovena Galyide (left), and Polina Gruzinov (right).

In 2025, Tikva first received funding from the Azrieli Foundation to support Holocaust survivors living in its housing units, helping the organization maintain significant rental subsidies in one of North America’s least affordable markets. The initiative is part of the Azrieli Foundation’s broader commitment to supporting low-income Holocaust survivors across Canada.

“It is a reflection of respect and responsibility. It is because of our gratitude for all that survivors have endured and all that they have contributed,” she Naomi Azrieli, chair of the Azrieli Foundation. “They deserve care, they deserve dignity and they deserve to live in comfort today and always.”

Read the full story here.