News - The Gyumri municipality has appealed to the Government to build two social housing apartment buildings under a subsidy program.

In Gyumri, after the construction of the Mush-2/2 neighborhood (2010-2012), no large-scale state housing program for the homeless has been launched in the last 13 years. Within the framework of the 2012 program completed (carried out by Glendale Hills), Gyumri's Mush-2/2 and Ani neighborhoods were put into operation with 1,756 apartments across 38 multi-family buildings: 640 one-bedroom, 528 two-bedroom, 464 three-bedroom, and 124 four-bedroom apartments. In total, 23.47 hectares were developed. However, this does not mean that after the large-scale project the homelessness problem was fundamentally solved, nor that the domiks disappeared entirely from the city; they can still be found in the city’s peripheral areas. In recent years, to alleviate homelessness, Gyumri has pursued social housing construction. To this end, on July 6, 2016, a memorandum of cooperation was signed between Gyumri Mayor Samvel Balasanyan and ARDA charitable foundation executive director Harat Stepanyan, laying the groundwork for the initiative to allocate state apartments to socially vulnerable families as part of the Gyumri Without Shacks program. As early as 2015, ARDA charitable foundation executive director Harat Stepanyan announced plans to build 12 one-bedroom apartments, with the project cost estimated at around 72-75 million drams. In August 2017, Gyumri commissioned the first social housing units for single, childless elderly people living in shacks or in dilapidated buildings. One of the half-constructed buildings on Tirdat Architect Street in the Ani neighborhood was rebuilt into a three-story building with 11 apartments thanks to the ARDA foundation, the Sepezyan couple, and Gyumri City Hall. During the conversion of one and a half floors into the newly built three-story building, 100 million drams were spent, of which 15 million was the city administration’s contribution, and the number of apartments was reduced by one, i.e., one 3-bedroom unit less. Later, as part of the program’s continuation, in cooperation with the ARDA foundation, the last two entrances of the building at 46/1 Movses Khorenatsi Street were commissioned, providing 18 more social apartments. With charitable funds, Gyumri’s social housing program continued in 2021-2022. Thanks to fund-raising by the Hayastan All Armenian Fund, Gyumri was able to construct two buildings, commissioning 50 apartments and one kindergarten. In 2022, the Government of Armenia announced that by 2027 it would eliminate tent-based households. In Gyumri, according to the latest data, there are still 2,506 tents and 1,000 homeless people, of which only 385 are considered earthquake-affected. The remaining tent dwellers have found themselves in temporary shelters for various reasons, and not all are city residents; among them are people from rural communities and even neighboring provinces. To ease homelessness, the Gyumri municipality included the issue of constructing social multi-family buildings in this year’s five-year community development plan. To approve the subsidy applications, the project was presented to the city council at an extraordinary meeting on December 3. The total cost of the project is 1.8 billion Armenian drams, with 60 percent, i.e., 1.08 billion drams, to be funded by the state. If approved, construction will proceed in two phases: 390 million drams in 2026 and 690 million drams in 2027. It is planned to build two new buildings at the edge of the Mush neighborhood to accommodate 100 families. The criteria for selecting homeless-status families have not been clarified; during the meeting the rapporteur noted only that selection would be prioritized. Subsidy applications must be submitted to the Government by November 15. However, as is known, the November 11 city council meeting did not take place due to lack of quorum. The city hall hopes that the arising issues will not hinder the relevant authorities from approving Gyumri’s social housing program, especially since the community is prepared to invest 60 percent. It should also be noted that there are many half-constructed buildings in Gyumri’s peripheral neighborhoods that could be converted into housing spaces with investment.