Cape Town – Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has officially opened the City’s new Safe Space shelter to help more homeless people get off the streets in the Durbanville area.
The mayor was joined at the opening ceremony on Wednesday, (3 April 2024), by Councillor Patricia van der Ross, Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services and Health.
The new Durbanville Safe Space, based at the Public Transport Interchange, will add a further 40 beds to the area, which is further serviced by the existing 220-bed Safe Space in Bellville.
City Safe Spaces offer social programmes to assist people off the streets sustainably, reintegrate them into society, and reunite them with family.
Personal development planning and employment opportunities are made available, alongside referrals for mental health, medical, and substance abuse treatment.
“This new Durbanville Safe Space will add to the City’s ability to offer caring solutions to help people off the streets sustainably, and to keep public places open and available to all,” said Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis.
“Overall, the City is spending more than R220 million over three years to expand and operate its Safe Space transitional shelters.
“Accepting social assistance to get off the streets is the best choice for dignity, health, and well-being.
“No person has the right to reserve a public space as exclusively theirs, while indefinitely refusing all offers of shelter and social assistance.”
The mayor said the City plans to open another new 300-bed Safe Space in Green Point in the coming months to complement the two Safe Spaces at Culemborg in the east CBD which currently offers 510 shelter beds across the facilities.
He said the City also recently supported a 63% bed boost to the CBD’s Haven Night Shelter, expanding this facility from 96 to 156 beds via a R500 000 cost contribution.
During winter last year, the City enabled several NGOs to add 300 more temporary bed spaces to cope with additional shelter demand, including the deployment of 184 Expanded Public Works Programme workers to assist NPOs.
“The City helps around 3 500 people a year through shelter placements or referrals to social services to get off the streets sustainably,” said Councillor Van der Ross.
“This includes 2 246 shelter placements, 112 family reunifications and reintegrations, 1 124 referrals to social services, and over 880 short-term contractual job opportunities via the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP).
“We are also offering our substance abuse programme, which follows the evidence-based Matrix model.
“The programme has an 83% success rate for clients, addressing a key driver of why people end up on the streets.”
The City’s Safe Space model includes:
- dignified shelter,
- comfort and ablutions,
- two meals per day,
- access to a social worker on-site,
- personal development planning,
- various social services including ID Book and social grant assistance,
- family reunification services
- access to substance and alcohol abuse treatment,
- skills training,
- help to find a job, and
- access to EPWP work placement
