The hundreds of homeless people who approach the popular La Milagrosa soup kitchen from the Santa Cruz street of La Noria in search of clothes, a shower and hot food, they will spend this Christmas without being able to access this resource.
Starting next Monday, November 27 and until mid-January, the center managed by the religious community Hijas de la Caridad de San Vicente Paul, closes its doors due to the renovation work that will be carried out over the next two months. inside, leaving the city with 100 fewer places to serve homeless people or people in situations of social exclusion.
During its 36 years of history, this social work has allowed its users to reduce the processes of exclusion and social marginalization to which they are exposed, offering hot food, showers and clothing, but also work services and social care.
This resource, which according to a city council report is the best rated in the city among users, has capacity for up to 100 people, although as recognized by the city council in the First Municipal Plan for the Care of Homeless People of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, are insufficient to serve all the people who crowd outside its facilities every day.
The Social Action Area of Santa Cruz de Tenerife has confirmed to this newspaper that users affected by the closure will be referred to the dining room of the Municipal Reception Center. An already overflowing resource that now faces the challenge of assuming the demand that the La Milagrosa dining room no longer meets.
Another alternative
Lorenzo (not his real name) has lived for years in a cave in Barranco de Santos, very close to the dining room. Although he admits that he does not go too often, he assures that the service provided there is very good: “Yes, I have been to La Milagrosa several times. The food is very good and the service is good, but I prefer to make a living and cook here,” he says while he hangs the clothes outside the cave that he has turned into his home.
For him, on the street it is essential to have a routine and look for things to do: “You can’t let the fact of living on the street cancel you out. I wash myself every day, I try to keep a good appearance, go to the library to read…” Despite not being a regular user of this resource, he considers that another alternative could have been sought to completely close the dining room: “Many people They depend on going to eat there, they could have done like in the pandemic, where they distributed takeout food,” he says.
An overflowing city
The latest Extreme Residential Exclusion Report in Tenerife, prepared in 2021 by Cáritas Diocesana, indicates that around 60% of the people who find themselves in this situation on the Island are concentrated in the metropolitan area, especially in Santa Cruz. Likewise, it states that 59.4% of the homeless people who are in the capital are there because they are seeking or have found help and specific care and shelter resources. According to this study, everything indicates that the lack of infrastructure of this type in the rest of the municipalities encourages internal migration among people from this group within the island towards the capital.
This explains why the Santa Cruz Municipal Reception Center, located next to the Pancho Camurria pavilion, in the Azorín neighborhood, is saturated and serving many homeless people who come from other parts of the island. This was recognized by the local corporation last September after unanimously approving a motion presented by the Popular Party during the plenary session. The proposal urged the Tenerife Cabildo to establish shelters for homeless people in the northern and southern areas of the island. The City Council considers that this municipal resource has been providing an insular service for some time and has formally requested the collaboration of the rest of the administrations.
