Mapping Homeless and Socially Endangered Families and Individuals (MK0123)

Mapping homeless and socially endangered families and individuals
Start and end date of the commitment: August 2018 – August 2020
Lead implementing agency
Ministry of Labor and Social Policy
Description of commitment
Status quo or problem addressed by the commitment
Lack of official data on the individuals and families with social problems and socialy excluded individuals/families, with special attention on homless people, in view of their number at national and local level, as well as well as identifying their needs for social help and community support.
Main objective
Coordination of the activities for identifying and supporting poor and materially endangered families and individuals at risk of social exclusion, with a focus on homeless on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia
Brief description of the commitment
Establishing mechanisms for coordination of activities for supporting poor and materially endangered families and individuals at risk of social exclusion, with a focus on homeless people on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia, thus providing the following:
establishing records of persons and families, - mapping the needs in the area of social protection, the available and necessary resources for assistance and support to endangered citizens / families, to reduce the situation in view of poverty,
coordinating activities between the Social Work Centres (SWC), the municipal administration, the business community, the associate Kindness, and other stakeholders for the purpose of recording the individuals, providing appropriate services regarding the provision of food, clothes, financial assistance and accommodation of homeless, and the remaining support of socially endangered families and individuals,
exchange of data and information on undertaken activities
OGP challenge addressed by the commitment
Establishing and improving services for vulnerable citizens
More efficient public resource management
Creating safer communities
Additional information
Refference to the Global Sustainable Development Goals - Objective 16 "Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions", Target 16.10: Ensure access to information and protection of fundamental freedoms, in accordance with national legislation and international agreements. The measures of this commitment contribute to promotion of access to public information through more efficient implementation of laws and better information of citizens.
Milestone
1.3.1 Social mapping of poor and materially endangered families and individuals at risk of social exclusion with focus on the homeless on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia and establishing a database based on mapping
1.3.2 Signing a memorandum of cooperation between stakeholders and implementation of Trainings for social space mapping Representatives from Social Work Centres, Municipalities, NGOs
1.3.3 Mapping the available resources for providing services to vulnerable groups in the local community
1.3.4 Coordination of activities between local social work authorities, municipalities, NGOs, in order to detect the target group needs and appropriate direction and provision of necessary services for poor and materially unsecured families and individuals at risk of social exclusion with a focus on the homeless at the territory of the Republic of Macedonia
1.3.5 Test period for implementation, monitoring of activities and ongoing removal of eventual anomalies Periodical data update in databases (every 6 months)
1.3.6 Regular database update in relation to detected needs and provided services The period of periodic data update in the databases should be reduced to 3 months / then to 1 month
Contact information
Name of responsible person from implementing agency
Sofija Spasovska
Title, Department
Deputy head of sector for social protection and social policy
Phone and e-mail
SSpasovska@mtsp.gov.mk, + 389 75 306 027
Other actors involved
Ministry of Labor and Social Policy State Statistical Office of RM
Non-government sector, business subjects, trade unions, economic chambers, associations and foundations
ZG Ljubeznost Contact: Toni Stankovski Е-маил: stankovski.toni@yahoo.com

Theme I: Access to Information

1.3 Mapping homeless and socially endangered families and individuals

Language of the commitment as it appears in the action plan: [18]

Establishing mechanisms for coordination of activities for supporting poor and materially endangered families and individuals at risk of social exclusion, with a focus on homeless people on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia, thus providing the following: - establishing records of persons and families, - mapping the needs in the area of social protection, - the available and necessary resources for assistance and support to endangered citizens / families, to reduce the situation in view of poverty, - coordinating activities between the Social Work Centres (SWC), the municipal administration, the business community, the associate Kindness, and other stakeholders for the purpose of recording the individuals, providing appropriate services regarding the provision of food, clothes, financial assistance and accommodation of homeless, and the remaining support of socially endangered families and individuals, - exchange of data and information on undertaken activities.

Milestones:

1.3.1 Social mapping of poor and materially endangered families and individuals at risk of social exclusion with focus on the homeless on the territory of the Republic of Macedonia and establishing a database based on mapping

1.3.2 Signing a memorandum of cooperation between stakeholders and implementation of Trainings for social space mapping Representatives from Social Work Centres, Municipalities, NGOs

1.3.3 Mapping the available resources for providing services to vulnerable groups in the local community

1.3.4 Coordination of activities between local social work authorities, municipalities, NGOs, in order to detect the target group needs and appropriate direction and provision of necessary services for poor and materially unsecured families and individuals at risk of social exclusion with a focus on the homeless at the territory of the Republic of Macedonia

1.3.5 Test period for implementation, monitoring of activities and ongoing removal of eventual anomalies. Periodical data update in databases (every 6 months)

1.3.6 Regular database update in relation to detected needs and provided services. The period of periodic data update in the databases should be reduced to 3 months / then to 1 month

Start Date: August 2018
End Date: August 2020

Context and Objectives

According to the action plan, North Macedonia lacks official data on socially vulnerable individuals and families. [19] The lack of accurate data makes it difficult for the Government of North Macedonia to identify the needs of these vulnerable groups and design more effective institutional responses to their needs. In order to address this, the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy aims to “map” poor and socially vulnerable individuals and families in North Macedonia, with a special emphasis on homelessness. The mapping will include data on social protection needs as well as available resources for assistance. The findings will be used to establish a database with records on individuals and families, which will be regularly updated (from every six months to every three months to every month). The commitment also calls for the signing of a memorandum between stakeholders working in the area of homelessness (representatives from social work centers, municipal governments, and NGOs) to conduct trainings for social mapping. Lastly, the commitment entails coordination of stakeholder activities to detect the needs and appropriate direction and provision of necessary services.

This commitment’s activities are verifiable and include some measurable indicators, such as updating the database with increased frequency. However, while the commitment indicates that the database of socially vulnerable groups will be populated based on the findings of the social mapping activities, it is not clear what specific categories of information will be included in the database. In addition, the commitment does not clarify if the database will be made available to the public or if it will be for internal use only.

Overall, the creation of the database could help improve the data collection of homeless and socially vulnerable segments of the population given the current lack of data in this area. Furthermore, the social mapping could help both government and non-government stakeholders (NGOs and social workers) to more effectively identify the needs of these groups and more efficiently allocate resources to address these needs. However, the commitment is unclear on a number of key points, which makes it difficult to assess the potential impact as higher than minor. For example, there is a lack of detail on what type of information will be included in the database, how stakeholders will conduct the social mapping to populate the database, how the database will be used to better address the needs of the socially vulnerable groups, and how privacy rights will be protected in the data-gathering and sharing. It is also unclear how the database and social mapping will help stakeholders better coordinate their activities in this area.

Next steps

The IRM recommends that the Ministry of Labor and Social Policy publish disaggregated statistics (broken down by region and municipality) on the number of homeless and vulnerable people and provide information on budgetary funds and services allocated to homeless people. To better shape policy towards the homeless and socially vulnerable, the gathering of data should include stakeholder consultations on the data to be gathered and its potential uses in advance and, following the data-gathering, the formation of working groups, including NGOs working on policy and those working on delivery of services to the socially vulnerable, should propose new policy directions and solutions to ease the problems facing the targeted groups.

[18] The texts for all the commitments are an abridged version of the commitment texts. For the full commitment texts, see the Republic of North Macedonia 2018-2020 National Action Plan, https://www.opengovpartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Macedonia_Action-Plan_2018-2020_EN.pdf

[19] Ibid., p 19-20.

Commitment 1.3 Mapping homeless and socially endangered families and individuals

Limited:

The Ministry of Labor and Social Policy held several meetings with CSOs to discuss data collection and database improvements. The ministry, in cooperation with the Inter-Municipal Center for Social Affairs of the City of Skopje and the CSO Ljubeznost, agreed on what data will be collected and defined how the gathered data from the mapping activities for the City of Skopje will be presented. [8] However, work on the memorandum of cooperation and related trainings for social work centers, municipalities, and CSOs have not commenced.

There is no information available regarding the status of the other milestones. [9] According to the government’s self-assessment report, the ministry postponed the regular database update in relation to detected needs and provided services and plans to start these activities in September 2021. [10] Some activities were impacted by COVID-19, but the self-assessment report suggests that the ministry will continue the initial efforts as described in the action plan, with adjustments. [11]