Homelessness spreads to the periphery

BarcelonaLeaves the tent, which by midday must already be an oven inside. “No problems, no police,” he says, looking from side to side. From the dozen tents in this corner of the Ronda del Litoral, between L'Hospitalet and Barcelona, no one peeks out when they hear a strange voice. At the door of each one there are sneakers and pool flip-flops that reveal that the owners have preferred to remain oblivious to what is happening outside and avoid problems. They are afraid that making themselves visible will force them to move again. This group has settled in a vacant lot between roads, having come from the evictions from the airport, the Ciutadella, and the Zona Franca. “They are looking for the periphery,” illustrate those from the organizations, who point out that they opt to go more unnoticed by the police and also by neighbors.

construction and the pressure of the city councils for construction and the pressure from city councils to clean up vacant lots or abandoned buildings causes the disappearance of shelters for those who could not afford decent housing. Amics del Quart Món are well aware of this situation, and a good portion of the families they assisted who lived in warehouses in Poblenou and Verneda have moved to Vallès. The director of this organization, David Espinós, explains that to continue with the scrap metal business, they have to look for lots in industrial estates, next to rivers. One of the families they accompany has moved to a new settlement, and every day they take their underage children to the school in the Sant Martí district of Barcelona, where they are enrolled. Scrap metal – illustrates Espinós – “needs large spaces like warehouses,” which is why it is not a group that primarily seeks an apartment or old commercial premises.

housing exclusion, a new concept to refer to povertyhousing exclusion, a new concept to refer to poverty.

The profile is also changing, and it's no longer just vagrants but a rejuvenated population, young migrants who haven't been able to find an opportunity to regularize their situation, people with mental disorders, but homelessness affects even permanent workers. Furthermore, there are increasingly more women, who often flee male violence. “Normally it’s gradual. First they lose their apartment, then the room, a friend accommodates them at their home, they go to a temporary shelter service, and if they haven't recovered, they end up on the street,” points out Bea Fernández, director of Arrels Foundation, a reference entity for homelessness.

Ciutat Vella is no longer the district with the most homeless population

On another scale, the same happens in metropolitan municipalities and those in the second ring. The city of Barcelona invests 51 million euros in addressing homelessness, but in this municipal term, it applies restrictions in the municipal registry for those without a fixed address that have made it cease to be a magnet for homeless people, points out social educator Judit Franco, head of the Espai Obert project at La Vinya in L'Hospitalet. How many people have left Barcelona? It is not known, but it is detected that since the capital is stricter, there are more movements towards less crowded places, although it is also true that with fewer services.

Municipal social services have also experienced an increase in users (social exclusion, dependency, immigration, etc.) and staff have to dedicate a lot of time to bureaucracy. "We put out fires rather than do prevention because we can't," warn social workers. Without help or social networks, falling into poverty is synonymous with chronic exclusion that is very difficult to overcome.

The desire to go "unnoticed"

Every Monday and Thursday night, groups of Red Cross volunteers go out into the streets of Cornellà de Llobregat to look for homeless people. In the car, they carry food, water, juices, fruit, even wipes for intimate hygiene, socks and clothes. They have 15 people under their watch, most of whom they have known for a long time, although there are always new ones. Tonight they are looking for a young boy whom they saw last week in some gardens and who was crying because he felt pressured by the Local Police not to settle there permanently. Today he is not there. For each attention, they pass on communication to the municipal services, but they rarely get a response about what follow-up is being done, explains Luis García, head of the volunteers.

In three hours they visit the usual places where people spend the night. “Good evening! What do you need?”, the volunteers ask. There are people who started out alone on the street, but growing insecurity has made them seek to group together to take care of each other, and thus rows of tents have appeared in corners of parks, in areas away from services, and along the 14 kilometers of the Litoral bypass. García indicates that they spend the day wandering around the city or neighboring towns and that in the evening they spread out their cardboard in places a little away from the public eye, but not too much, in a balance of being visible but invisible.

On the route, volunteers come across a couple in their thirties from Honduras and Peru. Theirs is a story of love on the street born out of the need to protect themselves, after losing the room where they lived because they couldn't afford it. They wait for the volunteers before leaving loaded with bags and a tent that has been gifted to them towards the orchard area, next to the Llobregatt. The man is registered in L'Hospitalet and can access the shower service and the soup kitchen, where he gets his ration and shares it with his girlfriend, who is not registered because the owner of the apartment never gave her permission. In the darkness of the night, they try to go unnoticed so as not to attract the attention of groups of young people who sometimes look for trouble. This is the moment when the woman takes the opportunity to wash herself. “The first night on the street, all alone, I didn't sleep at all. I was scared to death,” she recounts, stroking the sneakers that the Red Cross brought her. On more than one occasion, a stranger has touched her leg while she was sleeping, a situation that is repeated among many homeless women, warn from the Fundació Assís, which has specific services for women. “They usually endure complicated situations worse than men before ending up on the street”.

at least 6,724 people live on the streets or in settlements in Cataloniaat least 6,724 people live on the street or in settlements in Catalonia. The figure is, with all certainty, a minimum because there are three municipalities that did not respond and often many of these populations are not on the radar of social services, they are not allowed to register or it is difficult to calculate due to high mobility and change of sleeping place. Furthermore, one of the major deficits of the data is that other categories of homelessness (Ethos) are not taken into account, such as those living in shared rooms, occupied flats, substandard housing or those at risk of eviction.

An urgent law that is stalled

The Commissioner of Social Services of the Barcelona City Council, Sonia Fuertes, demands that "the Generalitat, whether it likes it or not," assume "global leadership" in homelessness policies because the magnitude of the problem overwhelms the municipal competence framework and that service planning be done according to the number of inhabitants. The draft law on homelessness, debated in Parliament since the previous legislature and resulting from pressure from entities, provides for municipalities with more than 20,000 inhabitants to be equipped with daytime resources, shelters, or storage, but does not mention housing. According to data collected by the ombudsman, 46% of municipalities do not have a soup kitchen and 28% do not offer showers.

The fact that housing is not included is "an error" for Fuertes, who advocates for cross-cutting actions with Health, Housing, and Social Rights, and for the population register to be a faithful record of who resides in the municipality. For years, the council has complained that Barcelona has assisted people "to whom their municipalities have not responded," and regrets that Barcelona "has led alone" in this field with "a plurality of responses" and an offer of diverse and specialized services.

To prevent those who provide services from ending up attracting unregistered residents, Fuertes points out that the Generalitat has the weapon of financing to pressure municipalities to assume responsibilities. It is an idea shared by the head of Arrels, who laments that municipal omission goes unpunished. This tool is known as ficha 48, through which the Department of Social Rights transfers economic contributions to the comarcal councils and municipalities of over 20,000 inhabitants that have previously requested it for the operation of services and resources, and if, after the deadline, the plan has not been executed, the money must be returned. Of the 110 basic social service areas into which Catalonia is divided (these include towns of over 20,000 inhabitants, comarcal councils, and inter-municipal entities), 40 have requested this specific allocation for homelessness, and at present, the settlements are being made to determine the degree of compliance, explains Anna Vila, Director General of Social Services and Inclusion. Between 2021 and 2026, the Generalitat has granted 83 million euros through this channel, in addition to almost 32 more for entities.

While awaiting the law, which will be born without an economic forecast, the Generalitat has extended the framework for addressing homelessness and is preparing a new one that will include funding for daytime care and for the hiring of street educators to monitor and build connections with the homeless population, advances Vila, who insists that the Government "is involved in the fight against homelessness" and has the will to "give and seek more resources" for the town councils.