When the Spanish Government decreed confinement and the state of alarm, the City Hall of Vitoria-Gasteiz opened a centre for the Vitorians who lived in the street on the fronton of Lakua. It was 14 March, 102 days have passed since then. The center can accommodate up to 51 people and 23 users have published a “extremely concerned” letter about their future. They fear that the new normality will bring with it the closure of the center and the return to the street. Social service policy makers have stated that they will not leave "anyone behind" and have promised economic resources for the evicted and a new project for the coming months. However, sources from the Center and the City Hall have pointed out to ARGIA that the City Hall has not presented any concrete plan and that uncertainty is the dominant tonic. During the lockdown, centers for the homeless have been opened in several towns and cities of Euskal Herria, and the lockdown is not an isolated risk in Vitoria-Gasteiz. For example, they have denounced that in early June the hostel for homeless women in Barakaldo will be closed, and they have just closed the fronton Atano III and the hostels La Sirena for homeless people in Donostia-San Sebastián.

Humiliated

In their writing, the evicted have exposed the living conditions of the center and those lived during these months. On the fronton of Lakua they have denounced that they have been “stables”, “like livestock in winter”. After 100 days they all live together on the court of a pediment, sleeping in their beds, situated a meter and a half distance, and without any intimacy, with poor food. Three long months with his “damn nights”, because as a result of noises it is “impossible” to sleep all night.

The signatories of the letter denounce that they have been humiliated at different times during the celebration of this act. They have been banned from shopping alone as any vitorian, they had to be accompanied by Red Cross volunteers, “with their striking and eye-catching red vests.” They reduced them and closed the only space they had to be in the open air, as some citizen complained that “they saw us through the windows; they call us lepratarras”. Comrade Yolanda, who died in the same center, was also reminded of “the pain was tremendous” (ARGIA reported his death, users reported that Yolanda had not received adequate medical care in the center and that its officials had ordered them not to say anything about death).

“We need the same thing we needed before the pandemic.”

Homeless people have highlighted the diversity and cruelty of their situations: “Each of our parents and our mother. Different nationalities, psychiatric problems, alcohol addiction or other toxic, uprooted, unemployed and older people excluded from the work system...” They have been assaulted by several users with addiction or mental illness, the death of a member, the rules and conditions they consider unfair... “And yet we have suffered. We have been able to channel everything.”

For all these reasons, users in the centre of Lakua claim to have won an opportunity and stress that the solution is not complicated: “We only need what we needed before the pandemic: to be well cared for in our social services, especially housing and assistance or follow-up for those who need it, treatments against our bad habits – in exchange for that accommodation – job opportunities, psychiatry that will not continually affect the pills…”

Take the opportunity not to return to the "ATM"

The resident of the centre of Lakua has expressed his gratitude to the workers and volunteers of the Red Cross who accompany them, but have strongly criticized the political leaders of the social services of Vitoria-Gasteiz. They have thought that a unique opportunity has been lost to track each person individually, as all homeless people are together for a month in the same space. “After several promises (‘we will relocate all people’, ‘there will be specific plans for inclusion’), in fact, and despite the lies of the top social service officials of the City of Vitoria-Gasteiz, they continue with the same pre-pandemic dynamic: they do not listen to us, they do not approach here, and on the few occasions when they do (three times an hour), it is to walk in time.”

After the lockdown, they say that the future “makes them very aggravated”: “Where are we going to leave here? Go back to the shelter, to the Open House, to the portal, to that ATM?” On the contrary, they have appealed to take advantage of the coronavirus crisis to provide solutions to their “everyday” crisis, “to bring something positive for us and for the city.”

They have asked vitorians and political leaders “not to return to the streets, to economic misery, to contempt and to oblivion”: “We sincerely believe that we have won that after three months, more than a hundred days. Don’t let us be thrown back.”