On 13 September 2013, CRP and its partner „Novi svijet Luščani“, the Head of the Centre for Social Welfare, Ms. Mirna Marčec and the Centre social workers visited the Roma community and explained the social welfare rights and obligations to the Roma citizens.
The meeting was held in front of the community house and the Roma city and county councils representatives, Roma NGOs representatives and community population were present.
The new social worker that will be in charge of the Roma community was introduced to the people. The Head of the Centre explained the social welfare rights, paying special attention to the fact that the maximal amount per person/family per year was HRK 2,500,00 through several payments.
The situation in the community is very difficult, especially due to lack of infrastructure, which is mainly caused by non-solving of ownership over the land. Overbuilding, i.e. unfinished housing units make the housing situation even worse. The population live below the poverty level. Almost all of them are beneficiaries of social welfare. They stated that the social welfare amounts were not enough for living and schooling of children. They said that the program of public works, as a form of employment of Roma, had proved to be very bad for Roma, because after three months of work, the person should go back to the Employment Office, without social welfare and the new social welfare application might take months.
Davorka Marton, social worker that knows the community very well, said that the situation was very difficult, but the Centre could not solve it, which was confirmed by the Head of the Centre.
The community population wanted to talk about their problems, but they complained about other persons if they achieved some rights and they did not, etc. The Centre Head said that everyone had a right to appeal. CRP reminded all the present of the free legal aid provided by CRP.
Svjetlana Grubješić pointed out the problem of the community house. It is one of the biggest problems for the community, i.e. the place for some joint activities, work etc. The problems related to the maintenance of the house came out. However, there is a legal problem, i.e. the house has no valid permits for its usage.
After the meeting, CRP, the partner and the Centre visited three Roma families. One of them is the most vulnerable family in the community, on which everybody agreed. It is the family of Predrag Vasiljević, invalid in a wheel chair with two children. CRP will cooperate with the Centre on this case in order to provide the family with social welfare services. It is planned to build the wheel chair entrance to the house.
It was concluded that the cooperation of CRP and the Centre for Social Welfare would continue in order to protect the living standard of socially vulnerable population in the Sisak-Moslavina County.
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