{"id":27378,"date":"2016-03-14T05:47:06","date_gmt":"2016-03-14T08:47:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=27378"},"modified":"2020-08-07T14:04:16","modified_gmt":"2020-08-07T17:04:16","slug":"vito-giannotti-occupation-continues-renovating-and-plans-to-develop-housing-in-the-port-region","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=27378","title":{"rendered":"Vito Giannotti Occupation Continues Renovating and Plans to Develop Housing in the Port Region"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas\"\"<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

On Sunday March 6,\u00a0residents and social movement<\/a> leaders at the Vito Giannotti Occupation<\/a>\u00a0in Santo Cristo in Rio’s Port Region<\/a> held the third\u00a0mutir\u00e3o<\/a>\u00a0<\/em>event to renovate the occupation space. Mutir\u00e3o<\/em>\u00a0translates loosely to ‘collective action’ in Portuguese and refers to\u00a0an event bringing community members\u00a0together\u00a0to undertake some group action on behalf of the collective good. Often, mutir\u00e3o<\/em> events are\u00a0held in communities to build homes, sewerage systems, clean up abandoned lots and streams, or to add another floor to an existing home. Around 40 people from\u00a0Vito Giannotti<\/a>\u00a0and its supporters joined the event.<\/p>\n

Since the\u00a0occupation<\/a> began in late January, residents and\u00a0social movement leaders<\/a> have been working hard to negotiate with Brazil\u2019s National Institute for Social Security (INSS), which owns the building, and the Ministry of Cities and the Caixa Econ\u00f4mica Federal Bank to initiate\u00a0the transformation of the site into\u00a0public housing.<\/p>\n

\"Residents<\/a><\/p>\n

The\u00a0occupation intends\u00a0to apply for Minha Casa Minha Vida-Entidades<\/a> (MCMV-En) funding to carry out further renovations to the building. MCMV-En<\/a>\u00a0is a small portion of the overall Minha Casa Minha Vida<\/a>\u00a0federal housing program that allows nonprofit organizations, collectives and associations to apply for funds and\u00a0build and develop their own housing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Vito Giannotti Occupation\u2019s goal is to ensure that the building, which has been designated since 2006 to be turned into public housing, fulfills its social function, especially in an area that is undergoing major changes.\u00a0There has been very little progress since the\u00a0promises made in August<\/a>\u00a0to increase the number of affordable\u00a0housing units available\u00a0in the Port Region. Further, Dilma Rousseff’s administration announced in December that the third phase of Minha Casa Minha Vida would commence\u00a0this month<\/a>. The large-scale program has received criticism for poor quality construction and creating conditions which reproduce social injustice<\/a>.\u00a0In this context, the Vito\u00a0Giannotti Occupation’s determination to develop self-managed housing in a central location is important.<\/p>\n

\"Vila<\/a><\/p>\n

Though most of the structure of the abandoned hotel building is in good shape, its\u00a0occupants work hard to clean damaged\u00a0rooms. There are a few rooms in the back of the hotel that remain\u00a0unfit for living until occupants find solutions to ward off moisture. In the past, the hotel interior was mostly covered with wallpaper. Although the wallpaper is gone, there is a thin layer of glue that covers almost every wall of the second and third floors. Much of the mutir\u00e3o <\/em>on March 6\u00a0was spent scraping this paste from the walls as well as removing carpet and other debris.<\/p>\n

The occupation residents have high hopes for the hotel building. The first and fourth floors will be set aside for community spaces, as well as a small daycare for children in the community. Every existing two to three rooms in the hotel will be transformed to house the families in accordance with MCMV-En standards.\u00a0The occupants plan to\u00a0create an office space inside the hotel so that social movement workers can spend more time there\u00a0and help the efforts as well. On the top floor veranda which looks out over the Port Region and North Zone<\/a>, occupants hope to build\u00a0a community meeting space for 50-70 people.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

The occupation process has not been easy. There has been resistance\u00a0from\u00a0the Federal Police who tried to force the occupants out of the building, and the occupation faces legal uncertainty, since they do not yet have full legal rights to live in the building.<\/p>\n

When asked how the\u00a0housing situation in Rio could be improved, the occupants noted the large number of abandoned buildings that could be transformed into housing at\u00a0relatively low cost. They \u00a0also emphasized the importance of this occupation in the context of the Port Region as a whole, which has historically lacked adequate housing and is now facing gentrification<\/a>\u00a0pressures from projects under the Porto Maravilha<\/a> development program such as the Museum of Tomorrow<\/a>\u00a0and the Light Rail System<\/a> under construction.<\/p>\n

As one member of the occupation, Julio, confirmed, \u201cWe cannot keep up with rising rents and the value of the property. We cannot stop eating to live. Adequate housing is a right for all and we must fight for it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas On Sunday March 6,\u00a0residents and social movement leaders at the Vito Giannotti Occupation\u00a0in Santo Cristo in Rio’s Port Region held the third\u00a0mutir\u00e3o\u00a0event to renovate the occupation space. Mutir\u00e3o\u00a0translates loosely to ‘collective […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":27383,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1267,1854,1668,1288,1290,329,1329],"tags":[1720,1261,219,65,282,26,1071,218,157,296,148,146,210,130,1965],"writer":[1732],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-27378","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gentrificationwatch","8":"category-housingwatch","9":"category-participationwatch","10":"category-highlight","11":"category-civilsociety","12":"category-solutions","13":"category-by-international-observers","14":"tag-affordable-housing","15":"tag-central-rio","16":"tag-collective-action","17":"tag-gentrification","18":"tag-housing","19":"tag-housing-rights","20":"tag-minha-casa-minha-vida-entidades","21":"tag-mutirao","22":"tag-minha-casa-minha-vida","23":"tag-occupation","24":"tag-port-region","25":"tag-porto-maravilha","26":"tag-public-housing","27":"tag-social-movements","28":"tag-vito-giannotti-occupation","29":"writer-david-robertson"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27378\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=27378"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=27378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}