“The old man I was caring for died in February and since then I have not been paid. I did not charge March, nor will I charge April, but Social Services has given me an appointment for May 25, what do I do all these days without food? ”Asks Maribel, an employee of the neighboring home in the Poble Sec neighborhood of Barcelona. “Milk, rice, onion, tomato, fruit”, he enumerates when thinking about what he will collect today from the support network of his neighborhood. But more than his hunger, he is concerned about his daughter, a 15-year-old teenager.
On April 24, a total of 21 solidarity networks in Barcelona signed a statement denouncing that they knew that the city’s Department of Social Services was referring cases to which they could not attend to mutual support networks. These banks, which previously fed 1,100 people, now cover 5,500. They have quadrupled the volume of their intervention and each week continues to increase.
A total of 21 solidarity networks reported that people from the Social Services of Barcelona were reaching them, a fact that the councilor was quick to deny
“I’ve been calling the social worker’s phone for a month, if I don’t even have food to buy, how am I going to have it for my mobile phone?” Asks Maribel, who got a private donation yesterday afternoon: “Yogurts, cookies , cheese, cereals, fruit and oil! Imagine: Oil! With this afternoon and tomorrow, we will have a great time in the coming days ”.
Maribel and her daughter have been in a flat recovered by the Sindicat d’Inquilins de Poble Sec for a year. This gives them peace of mind. “If I was for rent, I couldn’t afford it. When I rented, I paid one thing one month and nothing the next. With 500 euros of salary, look for what they achieve, “he recalls.
–Mortgage and Empowerment Moratorium
Zhora lives with her two children in a flat on her property. He has already spoken to the bank to request a moratorium for May. He has also been trying to collect unemployment after twenty years running a take-out business, which had to close six months ago when a vulture fund bought the building. He started cleaning for hours, but they disappeared with the pandemic. “I have been here for thirty years and it is the first time that I have had to ask for help. It has not been easy. But when you see that there is no other … “, he says without finishing the sentence.
“When you are alone, you only see what happens to you, but when you see that the same thing happens to two hundred others, you say, my mother, I am not alone, and you start to increase morale”
It is difficult for her to talk about it, she does not even elaborate that she not only receives the food basket from the solidarity network, she also distributes it twice a week. “Since I’m not working, I asked them if I could do something and here I am,” he summarizes.
Entering into the bowels of the solidarity network has been like a “therapy” for her. “When you are alone, you only see what happens to you, but when you see the same thing happen to two hundred others, you say oh my god I’m not alone, and you start to increase morale. ”
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Silvio Covolo, from the PAH of Poble Sec, highlights the importance of this empowerment. “When they wait for the food basket, a colleague explains what the neighborhood union consists of, the network is not welfare, but a solidarity network of mutual support.”
Today is the cast. From nine in the morning until four in the afternoon. From Poble Sec to Maresme, from Trini to Bon Pastor, from Badalona to Gramanet, food networks will distribute donations from individuals and the surpluses of MercaBarna that they have managed to negotiate.
For its part, in a telematic press conference, the councilor for Health, Aging and Cures of the Barcelona City Council, Gemma Tarafa, assured yesterday that the consistory has attended “To all those who have contacted” them and who, “in the event that a neighborhood support network has been found overwhelmed, we ask that people who need help refer us.” Lastly, he recalled that volunteers must be accredited so that they are not fined. the Urban Guard, as happened to the members of the Anti-racist Care Network of the city.
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