[ad_1]
José Fernando’s life gave “several potholes” until he reached the attic of a building in Ajuda, his first home after more than 20 years living on the streets of Lisbon.
“There are many years on the street, many years in which we walk down the street and we reach a point where – I speak for myself – we no longer know what it is to sleep in a bed,” he told the Lusa news agency , in his office. T1.
In fact, the first night he slept in the new house assigned by the Crescer association, within the framework of the “Housing First” project, which has the Lisbon City Council as its main partner, the bed covered with a red bedspread did not even ‘debut’ .
“Coming home is strange and I felt that strangeness, the first day I didn’t even sleep in bed, I sat here on the couch, watching TV, I was watching and I was not looking, and when I woke up in the morning I was sitting […] and I didn’t think I had a home, ”recalls José Fernando, 62.
They were left behind “several situations, several potholes” since they arrived in Lisbon in 1975 from Angola, at the age of 16, alone and without documents.
After “twists and turns”, he obtained a six-month valid resident card and got jobs in cafes, markets, workshops.
However, the ‘ups and downs’ followed one another, with the life of José Fernando alternating between periods in which he managed to pay for a room and many others when the ‘address’ was only a street in Lisbon. Until you start to “sink further”, do drugs and stop believing in people.
Later, already “clean” of drugs, he went back to work, but again things did not go well and he returned to the streets.
This year, in the midst of a pandemic, at the Casal Vistoso emergency center for homeless people he met Crescer technicians and “Dr. Américo”, president of the association, and in August he entered his home for the first time .
Two and a half months later, he already feels “lighter” and the priorities are to take care of the documentation and look for work.
Until then “you have to live one day at a time”, and many of those days are spent reading, sitting on the sofa under the living room window, in front of the turned off television.
“But if I had a job it would be spectacular,” he concluded smiling.
In any case, following the methodology applied by the Crescer association, the first step has already been taken: José Fernando has left the street and has a house.
“In the culture we normally live in, people have to show that they can live in a house and many times they have to go to treatments, they have to adhere to medications, they have to adhere to certain social supports to have a home. There are people who are 20 years old, 30 years on the street and end up dying and never having access to a house ”, described the president of Crescer, Américo Nave.
Housing First reverses this methodology and argues that a house must first be delivered and, “after people are in a dignified situation, in a more stable, safer situation, work on all the other issues and needs that each person has, both at a social level, as well as health, “he added.
The project was born in the United States in 1992 and seven years ago Crescer began working on the model with a pilot project of seven houses. Currently, it already has 85 “Housing First” homes, 55 of which emerged after the start of the covid-19 pandemic, and the goal is to reach 120 by the end of the year.
“Housing First ‘responds to more complex cases. The more complex the situation, the more effective’ Housing First ‘is in responding to these people,” reported Américo Nave, adding that the’ success’ rate is around 90% and that the average age of the people who are part of the project is over 50 years.
“They are people who already have a long history, a long journey in a situation of helplessness, unfortunately. The average time on the street is 15 years, but there are people who were 30 years old, ”said the official.
When they enter the houses rented by Crescer, the people who are part of the project sign a contract with the association and commit to meet “at least six monthly visits from the case manager”, an employee of the institution who can, for example , help clean the house, cook or even take care of hygiene.
When asked how long people can stay in the houses, Américo Nave responds with another question: “How many years can people stay in the street?”
“The objective of this project is that people do not become homeless again,” he exclaimed, saying that there are cases of people in the project who already work and have organized life, but still cannot afford a house for the prices charged. . in the rental market.
For the Lisbon City Council, this “is a model to follow”, it is the “matrix of work with people in distress”, without abandoning the other responses that “are still necessary”.
“There is still much to be resolved, there are still many people on the street, there are many people to contact, but I believe that the response we are giving is robust enough and with a guarantee of continuity beyond these years of crisis, to ensure that is available to these people ”, defended the councilor responsible for the Social Rights Area, Manuel Grilo.
[ad_2]
