While the water crisis currently gripping the Western Cape affects everyone, the most vulnerable in our society, such as the Central City’s community of street people are bearing the brunt the most.
According to Pat Eddy, manager of CCID Social Development, her team (which concentrates much of its effort on assisting street people towards the services they need), is noticing and getting feedback that people living on the streets are really struggling to access water in the Central City.
Says Pat: “While all of us must adhere to water restrictions and make a concerted effort to save water during these trying times, it is concerning that a section of our population is having difficulties in accessing drinking water, which is a basic human right.”
In a recent article, news agency, GroundUp reports: “Most homeless people rely on water from public facilities such as public toilets to drink and wash. But with water restrictions, there is no water in many of these facilities.”
When the organisation visited public toilets on Greenmarket Square, it found the taps were closed and this was also the case in The Company Gardens.
According to Ian Veary, social work manager at The Carpenter’s Shop – which provides ablution facilities, a second-phase shelter and vocational training – members of his organisation have also observed that their clients are finding it hard to access water.
“We have had more requests for water from our clients as well as people popping in to fill up water bottles especially during hot days. The fact that many places that usually served as points for collecting water are closed or no longer operating has meant an extra stress for homeless people, who have to seek out new avenues for accessing such a scarce resource.”
Ian further notes how adversely the drought has affected and forced his organisation to make adjustments: “We have had to initially cut down on the number of shower days for our clients. In January 2018, we made a decision to not allow clients to have showers but instead offer them bucket baths for which each client gets five litres of water. In addition, the costs of offering this service has increased due to the new water tariffs and may eventually make it impossible to offer.
“In light of the water crisis, I would like to see a dedicated waterpoint that can be available but also monitored for street people or homeless individuals to be able to collect water. An example would be on the Grand Parade or Greenmarket Square so that there is some security in terms of water availability.”
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