Fundación Punjab

Description

The first suggestion of the project “By Right” had an interdisciplinary objective, focusing mainly on social, educational and juridical assistance and attention of gypsy women prisoners’ families in the prison centers of the Valencian Community.

However, the experience after several years of development of the Project led to revise the original objectives of the latter, objectives which were exceeded by the needs of the gypsy collective of Castellón, unable to refuse the assistance to topics not included in the initial objective of the Project, because their problems constituted situations of real necessity.

To manage this, it was indispensable to adapt the objectives to the real situation which changed along its execution, and once the service was strengthened, it was more obvious.

With an eye to the important number of requests concerning the assistance and juridical information that continued to arrive to the Punjab Foundation, since the beginning of 2006, the fields of execution of the project have increased:

·    To the typology of the topics on which we offer a juridical assistance, without keeping to a concrete content, but leading us by the situation of necessity that the beneficiary who requires assistance suffers from, the only condition being that the requested information deals with juridical matters, regardless of the law field that has to be dealt with.
·    To the beneficiaries who need assistance, given that the possibility of assisting is offered to the gypsy collective of Castellón, with defining the scope of it to the gypsy women prisoners of Castellón, although by keeping territorially to the city of Castellón and its province, because with the important number of consultation, it is impossible to assist, with the resources that we have at our disposal, a wider geographical area.

As an immediate consequence of the redefining of the objectives, it was necessary to complete the tasks of juridical assistance, accomplished by the lawyer, with works of mediation and accompaniment.

These works of mediation are the link and the permanent contact between the lawyer, the beneficiaries and the relevant institutions on every topic, as well as by encouraging the diffusion of the services to all the families likely to benefit from it.

Objectives

The main objective of the project “By Right” is to structure an information and juridical monitoring service designed for gypsy families of the city of Castellón.

The specific objectives of the project become a reality on the following points:

·    To offer the beneficiary families, after a detailed study of each case, juridical and rigorous information about their situation, which include recommendations and concrete and practical interventions in order to resolve the presented cases.
·    To support the families in the steps to realize in front of the institutions or administrations involved in each case.
·    To refer, if need be, the cases that have been dealt with to expert professionals in order to resolve the suggested interventions. (1)
·    Follow-up and accompaniment of the mediation team of the project of the beneficiaries families to carry out the administrative and juridical steps.
·    Diffusion of the project and its objectives in institutions and in gypsy family contexts.

Methodology and protocols of the execution of the project.

Diffusion

As for the diffusion of the project, it has been suggested to increase it to families thanks to the visits at home. The visits will be done in a selective way according to the preliminary information that the team has at its disposal concerning the situation of the family. We also intend at the same time to maintain the institutional information network that we have progressively created and which provided us good results: the social workers team and the institutions and resources which deal with assistance to underprivileged families: La Llarm in San Lorenzo, Cáritas, Amigó Project, Patim...etc.

Inveiglement of beneficiary families

During the years when the Project was being carryied out and developing in the offices of the Punjab Foundation, the service of juridical orientation benefited from the strong establishment of this center between the gypsy collective of Castellón, as well as of the close relationship with the professionals who work on the premises.

The use of this headquarter presumes the synergy of the material and human resources that the Foundation has at its disposal for the benefit of the Project “By Right”, this place being a “social centre” in which a lot of activities and services develop, which presumes ceaseless crowds of people likely to benefit from the Project, that is why the inveiglement of the beneficiaries occurs in a fluent and natural way.

Assistance protocol to beneficiary families.

One afternoon a week, consulting each other beforehand with the staff of the Foundation, in order to coordinate the service in an appropriate way.
The adviser of the project, like it is structured, will develop the assistance to beneficiary families in a customized way by attending a variable number of them according to the pre-established appointments. The mediator of the project, in cooperation with the social worker, will take responsibility for the inveiglement of the beneficiary families, to handle and organize the appointments according to the urgency of the cases and the number of beneficiaries helped during the weekly session.

Case study

Once the visit is done, a report preliminary to the case will be drawn up, and will also contain intervention suggestions realized by the team. In this first report, not only the juridical adviser but also the mediator will collaborate and organize at the same time the planning of the steps to carry out and they will evaluate the necessity of following and accompanying by the mediator or other technicians of the team of the Foundation.

The juridical adviser will examine each case in an individualized way and will realize the appropriate steps according to the situation of the family: steps in front of the administrations, consultations with specialists in specific fields, brochures request…etc. As for the mediator, she will complete her tasks when the beneficiary families require an accompaniment to carry out steps in front of town, autonomous or state administration. (2)

Referring, monitoring and closure of the fields

As for referring the cases to other professionals of the Foundation, it counts on the experience and the network of collaborators as much in the function shift as other professionals who separated the beneficiary gypsy families of the project; according to the evaluation of the cases of their involvement, the juridical adviser informs the families about the existing possibilities and the professionals likely to be present.

Referring the cases is done in order to guarantee a better assistance to families. The team will continue to carry out a following-up of the progresses of the cases, by supporting with the mediation team the beneficiary family and ,if need to be, in constant cooperation with the lawyer to whom the case would have been reoriented.

Monitoring the cases will conclude when the report is finished.



(1) In the sense, it is useful to report the commonly approved decision by the technical team and the Employers of the Foundation not to deal directly with the cases that involve juridical stagecoaches, decision taken for two reasons that we consider important; on the one hand, to clarify the role of the coordinating lawyer of the Project, by saving the beneficiaries from disqualifying her personal ability in front of any failure in the courts, and on the other hand, the fact that the beneficiaries could get financial interests hidden in juridical trials.

(2) It is useful to underline in the sense that the beneficiary families of the Project have a particular profile characterized by the insufficient instrumental formation and a few reduced social abilities; that is why they frequently require the presence of a mediator who could make their steps easier. A high number of beneficiary families are functionally illiterate, relevant information to indicate the important function that the mediator exercises.