Instituția Zau de Câmpie din Mureș e închisă!

A mai căzut una! Instituția Zau de Câmpie din județul Mures e închisă. Avea o capacitate de 60 de copii. Munca a durat doi ani și a implicat operațiuni sociale, psihologice și de capacitate organizațională. Echipa de proiect (formată din specialiști ai Direcției Generale de Asistență Socială și Protecția Copilului Mureș și ai HHC România) au stabilit un plan de servicii care a inclus realizarea a două case de tip familial, sprijin pentru viața independentă, reintegrarea în familiile naturale și extinse, dar și folosirea serviciilor de tip familial deja existente în județ. Partenerii noștri strategici, ARK - Absolute Return for Kids, ne-au fost alături în acest proiect.

Am lucrat pe stoparea instituționalizării, prin prevenirea separării copiilor de părinții lor. Alți 41 de copii și tineri au beneficiat direct de sprijin, iar intrarea lor în instituții a fost evitată. Angajații serviciilor sociale au beneficiat de asistență tehnică, pentru creșterea capacității de implementare a programelor de prevenire.

Am construit două case de tip familial, pe modelul cuplului de părinți sociali, sprijiniți de câte un educator. 44 de copii sunt mai fericiți și mai aproape de o familie. Iar județul Mureș e mai aproape de reforma serviciilor sociale.

Zau de Campie Institution in Mures is Closed!

One more to go! Zau de Campie Institution in Mures county is now closed. The institution had a capacity of 60 children. The work took two years and involved social, psychological and organisational capacity operations. The project team (Mures Social Services staff and HHC staff) agreed upon a design of services which includes 2 small family homes for 24 children, the others being supported to start independent lives or being reunited with their families.

We worked with the local authorities, to stop institutionalisation and keep children together with their families. Other 41 children and youngsters benefited from our direct support in Mures County and were prevented from entering institutions.  The local and county authorities benefited from technical assistance, to increase their capacity to implement efficient prevention programmes.

Two Family Type Homes were built, on the model of social parent families, supported by an educator. 44 children are happier, closer to a family. And Mures county is closer to its reform of social services.

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The Closure of Institutions for Children Is a Priority for Structural Funding

The European Regional Development Fund report was voted in the REGIO committee recently, as announced by Eurochild. The Members of the European Parliament voted to keep a clause that identifies de-institutionalisation (DI) as a priority issue for structural funds. Concretely, the Rapporteur for ERDF and the Regional Development (REGI) committee not only maintained the text proposed by the Commission (“transition from institutional to community-based services”), but they further strengthened it by adding an explicit mention of services for family support (“community and family-based services”). Eurochild actively lobbied to achieve this result, knowing the crucial role played by early intervention and preventative family-support services, as well as fostering and family-like settings - as alternatives to institutionalisation. This is a step forward in formalising the allocation of structural funding for prevention and the creation of family-based alternative services. The completion of the de-institutionalisation process is more and more realistic.

10,000 Vacant Jobs in the Childcare System

The crisis in the childcare system in terms of human resources is easily visible: 10,000 vacant jobs. And the lower you go to the basis of the pyramid (where the people actually work with the children in state care), the more vacant jobs. Other 4,000 jobs are vacant in the system of adults in care, where the situation is the same: the lower you go to the direct work with the beneficiaries, the more vacant jobs. All social services have less staff then required by the structures of staff. In the institutions, there are over 900 jobs vacant. In the emergency reception centres, close to 200. In the recuperation centres, another 200. In the day centres, more than 200. And so on.

As we speak, according to an emergency ordinance issued by the Romanian Government, under the burden of the budget austerity, only one person can be employed to every seven leaving the jobs. On this ratio of 1 to 7, family type homes and other services run on half or a third of their staff need. What results in bad childcare. And this leads to hazard situations where, due to the lack of human resources, care and activities, the children and the youngsters are vulnerable. There is an open gate to accidents, to crisis situations, to abuse upon children, due to negligence and the lack of basic care.

As it is now, the childcare system is in crisis on human resources. The paradox is that, in the counties, the authorities have the necessary funds to employ staff. But the emergency ordinance that led to this lack of balance has to be revisited. Before it is too late.