The Hague still investing in priority neighbourhoods

The Hague Municipal Executive is making € 15 million available to tackle some of the underlying problems found in the city’s priority neighbourhoods (krachtwijken).

The approach will focus on keeping the neighbourhoods clean, preventing truancy, helping households in trouble, strengthening the economic climate and improving the Schilderswijk. 

The Hague is the only large Dutch municipality still committed to investing in the priority neighbourhoods in the long term. The money will be pulled out of projects for the four priority neighbourhoods of Transvaal, Schilderswijk, Stationsbuurt/Rivierenbuurt and Zuidwest.

Street block approach

At the same time the municipality is creating preconditions and it’s the intention that people seize the opportunities offered to them. The municipality will take a ‘street block’ approach to unemployment, truancy and inactivity in the neighbourhood. This type of approach has never been taken before.

Deputy Mayor Marnix Norder (Urban Development, Public Housing and Integration) strongly believes in a communal approach. ‘It stands a better chance of succeeding if you can’t claim that your neighbour is doing nothing as well.’

The municipality will crack down on people who live in a priority neighbourhood and do nothing to contribute towards their living environment. Residents of every street block will be spurred on to find work or to do something useful in the neighbourhood. There are plenty of options apart from sitting at home and twiddling your thumbs. Sanctions will be imposed on people who do nothing.

Examples of concrete plans for the priority neighbourhoods include making residents living nearby underground rubbish containers responsible for keeping the area clean. They can easily pick up bits of trash themselves and they can phone the municipality to report a mattress left on the street. The € 90 fine for littering will also be enforced.

‘We don’t want too many rules. We want people to take responsibility for themselves,’ says Norder.

Work

An important part of the approach is getting people off the dole and encouraging them to get to work. The municipality will go door-to-door and talk to unemployed residents to examine what they can contribute to society. ‘It can be volunteer work, a work-study project, schooling or a real job. If they don’t cooperate, then we’ll cut their welfare payments,’ Norder explains. The experiment will start at 20 spots in The Hague.

Schilderswijk

A separate plan will be drawn up for the Schilderswijk, where there is a concentration of unemployment and low incomes. According to Norder, the plan will aim to create more student housing, more economic activity and more variety.