Culturgest,

Lisboa, 13.11.15

Patricia enthusiastically explains Casas Primeiro, the project she works for,

dedicated to homeless people with mental health problems, who have been living for more than 15 years in the street.

We meet me in her lunch break and she uses every second to explain me her ideas.

She is deeply convinced of the effectiveness of this plan:

once it is possible to remove these subjects from the street and give them a house, it will be possible to do it with everyone.

Casas Primeiro is inspired by “Housing First”, a project coming from the United States that was implemented about six years ago in Portugal (the first country in Europe to follow this model).

Taking as starting point the basic right of any individual to have a house, Casas Primeiro aims to manage to provide people with an individual flat (individual in order to avoid conflicts) inserted in a good community:

_the person adapts to the context;

_the context will transform and support her.

The association Casas Primeiro provides a guaranty to the landlords for the rent-payment and the assistance team accompany the new tenants through all the bureaucratic processes and in the organization of their new living-space.

A residence certificate, and an address will consequently allow the access to the health and citizen cards, to receive a letter from a job center, to invite the family or some friends to visit them; this will permit to strengthen or recreate emotional ties!

Thirty percent of the house rent has to be paid by the tenant (via retirement, disability retirement, inheritance or social reintegration income) while the rest is supported partly by the city and partly by the institution Santa Casa da Misericordia.

Patricia underlines the need to abandon paternalistic and hierarchical attitudes, in order to keep people from the streets, away from poverty circuits, and in order to look for and offer a long term solution to the homeless situation.

In her opinion Casas Primeiro follows a model that responds to ecological principles, and based on sustainability: it is cheaper to rent a flat and assist people there then to offer assistance in the street.

The program separates the question of the treatment by the housing, considering housing and physical health as the first step toward a more secure, healthy, peaceful and dignified life.

Since Patricia deals with these issues she gives more importance to her own house, which she considers one of the most important things to maintain and care for herself and her family's well being.

...to listen is to imagine...

Thank you Patricia for finding time in your busy life to speak with me, explaining with so many details Casas Primeiro!

Good listening!

SPACE:

This interview recording took place in two different spaces.

The first is a Cafè/Restaurante inside the Culturgest Building during lunch time.

The big areas and the high ceilings provoke a dispersion, reverberation and amplification of the sounds.

The second part was recorded sitting in a coffee terrace, facing the street.

Also in this case, even if in a different way the sound was dispersed and contaminated by the surroundings.