Presentation given by Stefano Galliani, fioPSD President, Italy at the FEANTSA/HABITACT seminar "Tackling homelessness as a social investment for the future: Looking at the bigger picture", 12th June 2013, Amsterdam

1. IMPACT OF TACKLING HOMELESSNESS
ON LOCAL COMMUNITY FABRIC
Taking the community
as the starting point

2. Homeless service providers in Italy:
a brief overview
 National Survey 2011
(Ministry Labour and Social Policy - ISTAT – FioPSD – Caritas)
 Target group: ETHOS 1, 2 and 3
1. 727 different agency and institution in 158 different cities and town
2. 3125 services provided:
 35% answer to basic needs (food, clothes, shower, etc.)
 17% host people during the night (shelter, supported house, etc.)
 4% day centre
 24% advisory
 21% social support
 No question => no information about other (community) project

3. Homeless sector:
common focus on single person
(ETHOS 1, 2 and 3)
 Homeless people need a tailored pathway
 Homeless people usually have important
difficulties about relationships, jobs, income
and health, rights and access to home
=> reduction in active participation and
citizenships

4. Homeless sector:
limits to focus on single person
- Risk to deepen the division between city/
“common” citizen and homeless people
(segregation)
- Being perceived by neighbors as a problem
and not a resource for local community
- Usually tackling scarce resources (individual
and budgetary)
 This trend both for service providers and
homeless people

5.  Managing scarce resources and difficulties
or promoting opportunities?
 Remains outside the mainstream or being
leader in promoting a change in our society
model for a growing quality of life for
everybody?
 Working to change every single homeless
person or create social inclusion
opportunities by enlarging active
citizenships in the local community?
A different role for a different
homeless service provider?

6. Related questions:
 How to fill the gap between homeless people
and society?
 Are homeless people the solely responsible for
their life condition?
 What’s the common people quality of life during
this period of time In Italy (related to economic
crisis, fragmentation in relationships, conflicts in
neightbourhood, etc.)

7. Simple issues but difficult concrete
implementation (in Italy)
 Support for homeless people walks together with an
active citizenship pathway
 Service providers have to shift from the individual
disadvantage to promote the capacity building in the
(local) community for finding resources to prevent
homelessness and support homeless people when they
are outside the services
 To this aim, homeless services have to be theimselves
(recognized) resources in the local community using
proper expertise

8. An interesting example
 Casa della Carità – Cassino
- Small Institution in a small town recently
proposed initiatives to local community as:
- 1. training for pediatric unblocking
- 2. Basic training for comics authors
- 3. “Sommeliers” (wine and alcohol) training
- 4. basic IT training for elderly people

9. What’s the aim?
 More common people enter my institution
more people will know homelessness
 More people will help or offer opportunities to
the users
 More people will think to this institution for
charity and help my budget

10. Opera Bonomelli –
Nuovo Albergo Popolare (NAP)
 Former traditionally shelter (since 1957)
 Since 1993 became a residential service
focused on pathway “from street to home”
 150 users/year – ETHOS 1, 2 an 3
 35 employers (mainly educators)
 2 million €/year budget
 Now it is a multitask service “from homeless
area to promoting quality of life in the city”

11. Multitask?
 Organic vegetable cultivation
 Housing lead project in the neighborhood
 Social Cohesion project in the neighborhood
 Participatory planning of the neighborhood
green areas
 Etc.

12. Organic vegetables cultivation
 Users are employed
 Users sell the products in different
markets/ways to different clients (families,
schools, “critical buyer groups”)
 Plus : Organic is different!

13. Housing lead project:
one shared flat (three chronic former users)
 Neighbors feeling at the beginning: “again a problem
here!” “our district is already disadvantaged a part
this new project…”
 Floating staff since the beginning spent half work
time to support local association and neighborhood
committee + organize parties for residents and
playground for immigrants children living in the social
housing block
What’s the aim?
 More quality of life in the neighborhood means more
opportunities and less stigma for the three former
homeless people and …

14. … and Social Cohesion Project
 From the small experience to a three annual
project in the same neighborhood (about half
a million of € supported by a Bank
Foundation) to improve social and economic
quality of life for common citizens
 Money for every agency including a lots of
local partners - not “friendly”a few years ago
- like parish (priest and believers),
neighborhood committee, shopkeepers, etc.

15. … and participatory planning
 Money available by the Municipality of Bergamo to
renew the green areas in the neighborhood
 Deputy major and lead company decided to make
the process entirely inside the NAP
 They think NAP can offer a safe and favorable
environment for seven meetings
 Participants: common citizens, project managers,
deputy major, academics, journalists, homeless
people, social workers, etc.

16. Outcomes?
 NAP as now better accepted and recognized
as a resource to improve local quality of life
 NAP users have more opportunities to be
social included and more job opportunities
 More budget and more people employed
 More dynamics in the neighborhood
(next step: district Festival 21-30 June 2013)
 www.nuovamalpensata.it

17. Thank you
Stefano Galliani
presidenza@fiopsd.org