The non-profit organization Projekt DOM.ov was founded in 2016 with the purpose of helping socially disadvantaged communities, especially the Roma community, to gain access to adequate, high-quality and legal housing. The activity of a non-profit organization in close cooperation with the city or municipality includes field social work with clients, their education, counseling, mediation of construction financing, assistance in the preparation of construction and accompanying clients during the entire construction period. Families that join the project are educated and prepared for construction by field social workers (employees of the city or municipality) and the local coordinator of the DOM.ov Project. During this phase, the local coordinator and the construction coordinator of the DOM.ov Project, in cooperation with the city or municipality, will prepare the land for future construction and provide all the necessary documentation for the construction. The construction coordinator oversees the entire construction process up to approval and ensures the purchase of building materials. On a daily basis, a construction teacher (usually a person from the local community) works with the builders, who guides them throughout the construction. His role is to teach clients construction skills and control compliance with the quality of construction works and work procedures.
Part of the program is a unique microloan scheme, which is adapted for clients from socially or spatially excluded population groups. Clients of the DOM.ov Project receive a microloan before a one-year phase of savings and financial education, which will prepare them for repayment of the microloan provided.
By cooperating with us, in addition to decent housing, clients will acquire social, financial and work skills that will enable them to better apply themselves in the labor market and integrate within society in the future. We also help clients in their job search so that they can finance their housing in the long term.
An important aspect of the project is the involvement of the clients themselves in the entire process of procuring their own housing with their own money, which will subsequently also affect their relationship to the legal housing acquired in this way. We support families who want to take responsibility for solving their housing issue.
The non-profit organization Projekt DOM.ov carries out its activities in the Košice, Prešov and Banskobystrica regions. The organization has already successfully implemented a self-help construction program in four localities and is currently implementing it in another three. Currently, the organization Projekt DOM.mov has several hundred clients and has expanded its activities to the Novohrad area. Next year, it is preparing construction in eight to ten new locations in eastern Slovakia and 4 new locations in Gemeri. In 2020, the non-profit organization Projekt DOM.ov won first place in the SozialMarie award for the most innovative approach in social work, as well as the Roma Spirit award for active work to improve the situation of Roma in the country, for its long-term activities.
As part of the project “We connect for more opportunities” in the call for Norwegian grants, the city of Lučenec together with other partners of the project managed to get a significant subsidy. The project “We unite for more opportunities” received a grant from Norway in the amount of €749,000. The project was co-financed in the amount of €112,350 from the state budget of the Slovak Republic. The aim of the project is improved social inclusion of marginalized Roma communities.