Bench away at Hortusplein? Haarlem weighs and weighs about homeless nuisance measure

It can be quite intimidating when you walk onto Hortusplein and see a group of homeless people talking loudly and drinking beers on a bench. Some half in a psychosis due to drug use. And if you are eating on the terrace at one of the catering establishments, it is not nice to see a fight between a few homeless people.

But one of the solutions that the municipality now wants to take to contain this nuisance is going down the wrong way with interest groups. A stone seating area has been created around the tree in the middle of the square. If that couch is removed, the homeless from the nearby night shelter of HVO Querido will no longer hang around there, is the idea.

Street scene

Street pastor Joris Obdam of the Antonius Community and Petra de Vries of the aid organization Stem in de Stad find this incomprehensible. “In Rotterdam, The Hague and Amsterdam they also remove benches or put in extra armrests so that people cannot sleep on the benches. We should not want that here in Haarlem.” Joris Obdam would also rather not see homeless people hanging out on the street, but he thinks this is inhumane to keep them out of the streets.

“In Haarlem we always pride ourselves on being an inclusive city and this trend actually shows that we are not. Accept that people are sometimes different from us and that they also belong to the street scene.”

In a fierce letter, the organizations point out that there is not just a garden or balcony available for homeless people to stay on summer days. They also write about the impression that more and more people do not want to be confronted with this reality.

Enter into conversation

The municipality and HVO Querido are looking into a location for a bank closer to the night shelter location on Wilhelminalaan. “But there you are on the wind and here on the square it is also nice for them,” says Petra de Vries of Stem in de Stad. “But fine if there is a bench there. Actually, there should be more benches to meet each other.”

Petra also argues for a different, perhaps less easy solution. “Have a conversation with them. Imagine yourself as a catering entrepreneur on this square and get to know the homeless by name.” Joris demonstrates it for a moment and puts one hand on the reporter’s shoulder and reaches out to the other. “Hi Geja, how are you? Boy, you are very noisy today. Can we talk about that? And if that doesn’t work, enforcement can always be called in.”

Entering into a conversation with a homeless person in such a way is not for everyone. Both nurses understand that. But Petra thinks that this way you are socially involved with your business.

She herself sees on another Haarlem square, the Nieuwe Groenmarkt, where Stem in de Stad distributes meals to the homeless, among other things, that there is sometimes noise and rubbish is left behind on the steps of the church there. “Twice a week I go to clean there and then they (the homeless, ed.) Look on with shame on their cheeks. Recently one of them went to help me.”