Right to Housing for the Most Vulnerable Citizens

THE CONTEXT OF YOUR INITIATIVE

The right to housing is a prerequisite to exercising other fundamental rights (such as the rights to work, to found a family, to health, to private life).

In 1990 Emmaus Villafranca created the cooperative SOS Casa and bought a building that they planned to renovate, this building would house the first 5 apartments.
Decent housing was made available at affordable prices and specific support was provided for vulnerable people on the housing market (migrants, young couples, pensioners, single-income families, seperated parents), for the categories of people that are too “poor” to afford rents.

THE ACTIVITIES CARRIED OUT AS PART OF YOUR INITIATIVE

The SOS Casa cooperative is currently managing 36 apartments for around 100 people.

We organise awareness-raising activities and remind institutions of their duty to defend the fundamental right to housing.

In November 2015 we and the University of Verona co-organised a meeting on our experiences of social housing and we looked at comparisons.

In January 2017 we organised a public meeting about housing, we projected a video about the Winter of 1954 and held a debate with the person who manages evictions from the Court of Verona as well as a representative of the city of Villafranca.

WHO IS INVOLVED FROM OUR GROUP?

The group leaders, companions and friends.

WHICH PARTNERS ARE YOU WORKING WITH ON THIS INITIATIVE?

FUTURE PROSPECTS

Around 100 people, all of them vulnerable people in Villafranca, now have decent housing and pay an affordable rent.

Thanks to the many public initiatives led by the SOS Casa cooperative the topic of housing has been picked up on by the local media and there is now more lobbying of public institutions.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO ADD ANY INFORMATION ABOUT YOUR INITIATIVE?

WHAT ARE YOUR PROSPECTS?