Report on the Drug Situation 2010 - Bundesministerium für ...

The services in the field of housing are of a similar structure to those in the area of
employment: on the one hand, low-threshold emergency sleeping facilities are
available on a per-night basis, and on the other, there are services that focus on
finding long-term accommodation or flats for clients.
According to DOKLI (GÖG/ÖBIG 2010a) and as described in Chapter 8.1, one out of
two clients of low-threshold centres lives in an unstable housing situation 33 , which
gives housing programmes special significance. In 2009, Vienna's Konnex liaison
project of the wieder wohnen housing company started regular operation. It is a
project initiated by the Addiction and Drug Coordination Office of Vienna (SDW) with
the goal of supporting the staff of wieder wohnen with regard to responses to addicted
people living in wieder wohnen flats. The services by SDW include advice and support
by drug experts, who provide information on substances, modes of administration as
well as available services provided by Vienna's network of drug services. In 2010, these
services by SDW will be expanded to other houses of wieder wohnen, residential
buildings of other social service organisations (e.g. Gruft and JUCA) and houses of the
Workers' Samaritan Federation Austria (ASB).
The Vienna Addiction and Drug Coordination Office expanded its services, doubling
the capacities of low-threshold centres, as a response to the recommendations given
in the (not yet released) study on addicted patients in Vienna's public space, drawn up
by the European Centre for Social Welfare Policy and Research, according to which
approximately 300 people addicted to illicit substances who need daily structure
services are living in Vienna (see GÖG/ÖBIG 2009b; Sucht und Drogenkoordination
Wien 2010).
TaBeNo-Süd, a new temporary day-care centre providing basic, emergency and crisis
intervention services for addicted people was established at Wiedner Gürtel in Vienna’s
4th district. In the day-care centre, the clients may take part in creative work projects
or do low-threshold work. TaBeNo-Süd also has an emergency sleeping facility, which
until the end of 2011 will replace the one formerly run by Ganslwirt, and then it will be
relocated to the new Ganslwirt centre at Gumpendorfer Gürtel in Vienna's 6th district.
In addition, Ganslwirt’s location at Esterházygasse was expanded (and has longer
opening hours now), currently providing day structure for around 100 clients per day
(Sucht und Drogenkoordination Wien 2010; see Chapter 7.2).
33
On the other hand, in the group of persons receiving long-term services 90% say that their housing situation is
stable. However, when interpreting the statements about the housing situation, it should be noted that ‘stable’
does not necessarily mean that the housing situation involves no problems whatsoever (e.g., problems may
exist if clients still live in their parents’ household for want of an alternative on account of their drug problems).
Chapter 8 / Social Correlates and Social Reintegration 75