The City Council offered emergency accommodation last weekend to Mauricio and his family, but this Monday, in the midst of the DANA outbreak, they were forced to leave it: “They tell us that we are registered in Huesca and that we must return there”
The Ombudsman investigates the Valencia City Council for the treatment of homeless people
Mauricio arrived in Valencia on October 20 with his wife and his 7 and 8 year old children with their van and their personal belongings. An architect by profession, he fled Colombia three years ago after being threatened with death by the paramilitaries and initially ended up in Malaga, where he requested asylum, which allowed him to have a work and residence permit and work in the world of construction. , from a laborer at first to even a manager.
After managing to gather some savings, he brought his wife and children from Colombia and moved first to Ávila in search of a greater and more affordable housing offer and later to Pamplona. In both cases he had problems staying in a house so he had to resort to hostels. Their savings were running out and they finally contacted the Red Cross, an organization that helped them find accommodation in Huesca. There they stayed in an APIP-ACAM Foundation home dedicated to residential care for vulnerable people in a house shared with 40 other people. At the same time, his asylum request was denied, so, according to Mauricio, although he appealed, he was automatically removed from the register.
In the midst of all this administrative mess, they decide to move to Valencia: “It is a much larger city where we think we can have more job opportunities to support my family. Furthermore, I needed to get my wife out of that environment, she has psychiatric problems due to this whole situation, she was hospitalized for six months and they have given her a 49% disability.”
Upon arrival in Valencia, they stayed in their own van, putting an inflatable mattress in the back for the children, hoping to find some help and a job to improve their situation. However, the legal tangle over his asylum request and the surprising response from the social services of the Valencia City Council is complicating his situation in the middle of DANA: “Thanks to an interview they did with us last week in the newspaper Lift-EMV Regarding our situation, the City Council provided us with emergency accommodation in a hostel from October 25 to 28, as we were told, as a precaution due to the weather forecasts. But this Monday they told us that we had to leave, just now that the weather is getting worse.”
Regarding the reasons for the eviction, they explained that the municipal social services have told them that they cannot do anything because they are not registered in Valencia, but in Huesca, and that therefore what they have to do is return there, they even told them that They were “irresponsible” by leaving there and coming to Valencia.
According to Mauricio, “by being left out of the asylum program, in theory we should not be registered, but we do not understand that it is an impediment to offering emergency help when we have two minors sleeping in a van in which, by the way, some water enters when it’s raining; We are desperate, but we will continue here until we find something else, we can’t do more.”
According to various non-governmental organizations consulted by this newspaper, neither the social services law nor the emergency aid of the Generalitat Valenciana establishes that the beneficiaries have to be registered and in fact they affirm that aid has been granted to people who are not registered. on many occasions. These entities have stated that they have recently received cases of people who are being required to register for six months, something that must respond to internal instructions, but that would not be regulated in writing.
Political fight between PP and PSPV
The PSPV-PSOE denounced this Tuesday the situation of “abandonment and helplessness” of the Colombian family with two minor children who have been forced to live in a van in the middle of the street in the city of Valencia and criticized the City Council for being “ unable to attend” this “very serious” emergency.
The socialist spokesperson in the council, Borja Sanjuán, regretted that this family in a situation of “extreme vulnerability” has not been assisted by municipal services in “full weather alert” and despite the fact that “they have contacted them”, something which he has considered “inconceivable.”
Sanjuán highlighted that the ways in which this family has been responded to “are not ways to treat people who sleep on the street” and urged the mayor, María José Catalá, to “take an interest in it” so that this family “does not end up the day sleeping in a van.” “The dignity of a city is measured in how it responds to these cases, it is not a partisan issue, but one of mere humanity,” he expressed.
For her part, the Councilor for Social Services, Marta Torrado, indicated that the Valencia City Council “always” is willing to assist “any person who comes to our city” because the powers of the city councils “speak of urgency.” although he specified that this specific case involves a family registered in Huesca, with two small children “with an obligation to send them to school” and with the father “with a job” in this city.
For this reason, he has stated that he “does not understand how without saying anything” the Huesca City Council, the Government of Aragon and the Government of Spain “decided unilaterally, without informing anyone, to come to our city.” Despite this, he assured that the Valencia City Council, for “reasons of urgency and humanity”, attended to this family “the first days”, but stressed that in Huesca “they are complaining to them because they have the obligation to send the two minors to school.” by being registered there.
Therefore, argued Torrado, the Valencia City Council cannot provide them with “any emergency aid”, given that the “first requirement” for this is, “logically”, that they be registered in the city. In addition, the councilor indicated that the council is holding talks with the family so that they can return to Huesca and, “from there, they can continue with this help,” while urging the Government of Spain to “assume its powers in matter of protection.”
The socialists assured that they had informed the Ombudsman for Minors and the Ombudsman of Greuges of this situation because “this is not the first time that Valencia has been in the news for abandoning families on the street.” “The abandonment of the CAI and the cutting of emergency care places due to the closure of resources is leading to the collapse of the city’s social services,” they warned, while describing the PP’s management as “shameful.”
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