Social inequality and refugees and homeless people in Cologne
“How is there to be a city without anti-Semitism, without racism and without sexism if social inequality continues to increase?
How is universal fear to disappear from the city as long as people fall through the meshes of the social net into the bottomless pit?”
(On 5 August 2020, these questions were at the end of our daily report from the vigil against housing shortages at Alter Markt. To be read in the book RatSchläge gegen Wohnungsnot und Stadtzerstörung, Weissmann Verlag, Cologne 2020, p.17).
At 1.50 a.m. on Monday, two men of about 20 years of age seriously injured a 46-year-old homeless woman with a baseball bat in Cologne-Longerich. They wanted her money.
Only one of the reasons why homeless people die earlier is violence against them. The main cause is poverty and its consequences when living on the streets. Homeless people die thirty years earlier than the average population in the Federal Republic. https://www.hinzundkunzt.de/lebenserwartung-obdachlose/
The social physician Gerhard Trabert, who stood for the Left Party in the election of the Federal President, in an interview with the Süddeutsche on 29 August 2022: “Mahatma Gandhi once said: “Poverty is the worst form of violence.” We have the money, we are a rich country, we can act. If we still don’t do it, then that is also a form of structural violence. In our society there is not only racism and sexism, there is also a kind of classism. People from the lower classes are systematically disadvantaged.”
It is therefore no coincidence that yesterday’s Stadt-Anzeiger did not report that the city has created 128 new places for homeless people in Poll. The correct news item in the Stadt-Anzeiger of 2.9.2022: New accommodation for refugees from Ukraine.
Why is no thought given to the homeless when new places for refugees are created?
A recent press release by the Cologne Refugee Council recalls that the Cologne City Council decided on 4 February 2021 to dissolve the “communal” accommodation for refugees. It also quotes in detail from the city’s violence protection concept:
https://koelner-fluechtlingsrat.de/downloadpresse/2022/106/2022-08-30_PM_HardtgenbuscherWeg.pdf
Why is it too much to ask to decide and implement the abolition of the emergency shelters for homeless people?
Why is the SKM, which runs the emergency shelters in Vorgebirgsstraße and Ostmerheimer Straße, not prepared to publicly declare the same as the Refugee Council?
The city has presented the 32nd refugee report:
https://ratsinformation.stadt-koeln.de/getfile.asp?id=888188&type=do
Why is there no comparable report on the situation of the housing and homeless?
Why are motions in the Council necessary to get information about the situation of homeless women, for example?
https://ratsinformation.stadt-koeln.de/getfile.asp?id=892250&type=do
Abolishing homelessness can be done if you want to
Stefan Rahm reports in the Stadt-Anzeiger on 31 August 2022: “Hans Mörtter is having a house built on the corner of Bonner Strasse/Schönhauser Strasse with 30 Housing First flats for homeless people. “The financing is in place, we will have the building permit shortly.”
The Düsseldorf street newspaper FiftyFifty has introduced Housing First in Germany
Finland – a state that takes the homeless off the streets
Putting a stop to land speculation
StadTraum 5 und 4 e.V.:
Anyone who buys a vacant plot of land from the city of Ulm has to build on it, otherwise it goes back to the city hall at the same price at which it was bought. This discourages land speculators from acquiring plots of land and later selling them on at a higher price.
Surely this could be a model for other municipalities and a good day’s work for the common good, City of Cologne?
Netzwerk Immovielien – Architects for Future – WandelWerk Köln – Machbarschaft Petersberg – Genossenschaft für Gemeinwohl – AGORA Köln
Street newspapers – the example of Hamburg
Everyday life
Over 500 homeless people sell the street magazine “Hinz&Kunzt” every day in Hamburg
https://taz.de/Der-Strassenzeitungsverkaeufer/!5874648&s=Ruth+Lang+Fuentes/
To the story
Thirty years ago, “Draussenseiter” was the first German street magazine to be created
https://taz.de/Archiv-Suche/!5874649&s=Jan%2BZier&SuchRahmen=Print/
Reflection
Stephan Karrenbauer after 27 years of social work at “Hinz&Kunzt”.
“I have the feeling that the homeless aid is in the process of managing homeless people. We are in the process of providing more and more for people on the street. We now have the shower bus, we have people distributing food on the street. It’s all necessary because we’re not getting the root addressed, which is giving them a home.”
https://taz.de/Sozialarbeiter-ueber-Wohnungslosigkeit/!5874587&s=Friederike+Gr%C3%A4ff/
From the history of the housing struggle in Cologne
Cologne’s First Fat Rent Party
Let’s party!
Almost 1000€ warm rent for this spacious – refurbished and furnished – 40 square meter apartment! Of course, quality has its price. This is with 21.5 € / m² but quite usual for the market. New apartments of up to 30 square meters in Cologne cost an average of 16.6 euros/m².
Performance has to be worthwhile and that’s why we don’t let it spoil the fun! Not by the more than 3500 refugees who live in Cologne, in containers or gymnasiums, not by the more than 5000 homeless people in Cologne and also not by the more than 270,000 households whose income is so low that they would be entitled to a social housing, if there were so many.
Let us all celebrate
Housing for the rich!
23.02.2016
Worth reading
When corporations manage protest
http://www.konzernprotest.de/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Konzernprotest-A4-Broschu%CC%88re-WEB.pdf
This fits the speech of Andrea Brock at the 3.RWE Tribunal on 23.04.2022 in Düsseldorf about the entanglement of RWE and NRW state politics, which conveys what corporate counterinsurgency means. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpSYfVQZdwY
broadcasts, messages, news
Congratulations
sub\urban . journal for critical urban research turns ten!
https://zeitschrift-suburban.de/sys/index.php/suburban/announcement/view/99
Why people lose their homes and how they live when they do
Debt, divorce, violence: there are many reasons why people lose their homes. The latest statistics report from Relief Services shows who is affected – and why the numbers are likely to rise soon.
Real estate: How can property become affordable again? Broadcast Three Times Better
“Do I freeze and eat enough? Or do I not freeze and go without food?”
Social medicine expert Trabert: Poor people will get sicker in winter
Homeless Cologne woman seriously injured by attackers with baseball bats
https://www.nrw-aktuell.tv/2022/08/koln-obdachlose-kolnerin-von-angreifern.html
Hard Germany – Life in a hot spot , Cologne 2
Homeless drug addict in Cologne
https://www.tvnow.de/shows/hartes-deutschland-16120/2022-08/episode-6-koeln-2-4928192?utm_source=rtl2.de&utm_medium=teaserbox&utm_campaign=folgenswiper&utm_term=hartes-deutschland-leben-im-brennpunkt&format=Hartes%20Deutschland%20-%20Leben%20im%20Brennpunkt
GAG publishes figures for first half-year
https://www.report-k.de/gag-veroeffentlicht-zahlen-fuer-erstes-halbjahr/
Land use plan for Deutz harbor available for viewing
https://www.report-k.de/flaechennutzungsplan-fuer-deutzer-hafen-einsehbar/
Dates
03.09.2022, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m., Rally against vacancies: “Apartments for homeless and refugees”, corner of Berrenrather Str. / Friedrich Engels Straße
04.09.2022, 11:15 a.m. Hans Mörtter’s Dismissal Service in the Luther Church
08.09.2022, 15:30, Council of the City of Cologne
08-25.09.2022, “UPDATE NACHHALTIGKEIT” – Festival for new building culture
Apollo-Hochaus / Kö 106, Königsallee 106, 40215 Düsseldorf https://bda-festival.de/
09/10/2022, 10am – 3pm, Planning for the new Kreuzfeld district, Church of Saint Catherine of Siena, Schneebergstr.63
https://www.stadt-koeln.de/leben-in-koeln/veranstaltungen/daten/31458/index.html
11.09.2022 Day of the homeless
https://www.stadt-koeln.de/politik-und-verwaltung/presse/tag-der-wohnungslosen
14.09.2022, 14 o’clock, speech of social department Rau to the day of the homeless, Rudolfplatz
https://www.stadt-koeln.de/politik-und-verwaltung/presse/mitteilungen/24981/index.html
17-25. 09. 2022 , Photo exhibition “mülheim anders” at SSM, Am Faulbach 2
20.09.2022, 19:30 – 21:30 clock; Housing shortage in Cologne, with Michael Weisenstien and Kalle Gerigk, Salon Freiraum, Gottesweg 116a, 50939 Cologne
https://nrw.rosalux.de/veranstaltung/es_detail/26NBT/wohnungsnot-in-koeln-%E2%80%93-was-kann-die-stadt-tun?cHash=d2f1090cc18ef70648cb5442e54d902e
22.09.2022, 15:30 o’clock, social committee
23.09.2022, from 15 o’clock, opening of the pioneer park, Bischofsweg 48-50
https://www.parkstadt-sued.de/einladung-eroeffnung-des-pionierparks-am-22-september-2022
08.10.2022 European and nationwide day of action for a rent freeze
https://europeandayofactionforhousingrights.wordpress.com/
10.10.2022 International Homeless Day
02.-06.11.2022 Meeting: European Action Coalition fort he Right to Housing and to the City in Athens. https://housingnotprofit.org/
03.11.2022, 19 h, Master plan against destitution? Discussion on homelessness and drug addiction. With Monika Kleine, SKF, Stefan Lehmann, Department of Health, Dominik Meiering, Pfarr, Harald Rau, Department of Social Affairs. Karl Rahner Academy, 5 €
10.11.2022, 9 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. Council of the City of Cologne.
For a city without homelessness
For a city without forced evictions
For a city without drug deaths
For a city without violence against women and children
For a city without deportations
For a city without poverty
03 September 2022
Klaus Jünschke and Rainer Kippe
https://wohnungsnot.koeln
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Translated with DeepL