It is being one of the hottest summers on record and the cool water feels like a balm in the face of temperatures that have frequently exceeded 40 degrees, successive heat waves and tropical nights that have barely breathed. For this reason, refrigerating the bottles of water before distributing them is one of the first tasks in the daily routine of the social worker Paqui Parra and the local police officer Pedro Sánchez, two of the members of the Mobile Emergency and Social Care Service of the Department of Social Welfare (Semas), before touring the streets of Murcia to help the homeless, a group particularly vulnerable to the ravages of these adverse weather conditions.
In order to protect these people from high temperatures, Semas carries out different devices to assist them and inform them of the resources available to them. This team is made up of five local police officers and five social workers, who go in pairs and are in charge of walking the streets of the municipality and distributing cold bottles of water to the homeless, so they can hydrate, and caps. A task that is planned in advance to be able to be prepared for heat alerts, but which are carried out throughout the summer.
This summer campaign, they say, is being one of the toughest to date. This summer more than 500 performances have been carried out. “I will not say that there are 500 people because there is not that number on the street, but we have repeated with the same person several times,” Morales qualifies. A figure that has increased considerably compared to the previous year because the episodes “are repeated with some frequency.” During 2022, “about 200 interventions” were carried out, which represents an increase “of more than double”. As he explains, the pandemic had an impact on the vulnerability suffered by this group: “Many have not yet recovered.”
This 2023, the work they carry out on the street has intensified and it is expected that they will continue during the coming weeks. “Even if September starts, if another circumstance of extreme heat occurs again, we will also be there.”
So many years mean that the places where these people usually live or frequent are perfectly known, so the route is marked by experience. The work is ‘simple’: inspect the areas, get out of the van and approach them to offer them a bottle. They also try to inform them of the possibilities they have to be able to leave the street. But this is only the tip of the iceberg. “Beyond immediate attention to us, what interests us most is insertion, social, personal, work and family,” says José Morales, Semas coordinator.
In some cases, the team already knows some of these people who live on the street and even gestures for them to stop and give them water when they see the Semas vehicle appear. This is the case of EB, a Tunisian citizen who arrived in Murcia several years ago and who was in a situation of homelessness. He is an old acquaintance of these professionals, who about a month ago, thanks to his work, managed to find a flat where he could build his home.
This service has the collaboration of different associations such as Hogar Sí, ACEM, Cruz Roja or Jesús Abandonado, in order to reach as many users as possible. In addition to dining rooms where they can go to eat and buildings where they can spend the night. In fact, this year, given the adverse weather events that have occurred in the municipality, an initiative has been launched with the Jesús Abandonado day center, which remains open 24 hours so that anyone who needs it can come. In addition, in collaboration with Civil Protection, work has been carried out to transfer homeless people to conditioned shelters.
“Murcia City Council has a great commitment to help these people who are on the streets, give them resources and tools so that they can be included in labor reintegration programs and that this situation does not become chronic,” says Pilar Torres, councilor for Social welfare.
“Mostly Male” Profile
The profile is “mostly male,” Morales determines, although he stresses that “also the fact of being a woman on the street causes particular risks.” However, she appreciates a change in recent years. “A few decades ago they were mainly people of Spanish nationality, because now those who are in this situation are from various countries, and there are also more young people.”
However, there are also cases where some people refuse this help. «There has been the circumstance of offering someone water and being consuming alcohol and not wanting to. We have also offered a bed to sleep that night and there are those who have given in and those who have not. We have to respect the individual freedom of the person who is on the street, unless it is dangerous for himself or for third parties or that he has some judicial measure, “says the Semas coordinator. «When you least expect it, they may come to see you and ask for help that they had previously refused. What we do is a long-distance race”, emphasizes Morales. The work they do is ‘persistent’ and, like good ‘guardian angels’, they never give up.
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