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The more than 90 member organisations of FEANTSA come from over 29 European countries, including all 25 Member States of the European Union. Members are non-governmental organisations that provide a wide range of services to homeless people including accommodation and social support. Most of the members of FEANTSA are national or regional umbrella organisations of service providers. They often work in close co-operation with public authorities, social housing providers and other relevant actors.

Structure

FEANSTA is democratically structured to involve as many member organisations as possible. The guiding bodies of FEANTSA are General Assembly (which involves all member organisations), an Administrative Council (consisting of one representative for each EU Member State) and an Executive Committee (comprised of up to 7 members drawn from the Administrative Council). FEANTSA also has a small office based in Brussels which is responsible for the day-to-days operations of the network.

Aims

• Promote and support the work of organisations that provide services to meet the needs of homeless people in terms of accommodation and personal welfare.
• Encourage cooperation between NGOs, policy makers and public authorities at all levels, in order to improve the effectiveness and the integration of services for homeless people.
• Engage in dialogue with the European institutions and with national governments in order to promote the development and implementation of effective policies.
• Raise public awareness about the situation of homeless people, and of the need to recognise the right to decent and affordable housing for all.

• Influencing Policy

• To engage in constant dialogue with the European institutions and national and regional governments to promote the development and implementation of effective measures to fight homelessness.

• To make European, national, and regional decision-makers aware of the urgent need to develop pro-active policies aimed at effectively preventing homelessness.

• To raise public awareness about the complexity of homelessness and the multidimensional nature of the problems faced by homeless people.

• Transnational Exchanges

• To promote and facilitate the exchange of information, experience and best practice between FEANTSA's member organisations. This exchange gives members access to effective and innovative approaches to the problem of homelessness.

• To this end FEANTSA organises regular European seminars and conferences which bring together service providers, researchers and decision-makers. In addition, FEANTSA has four working groups, where members discuss relevant issues and themes surrounding housing, employment, health and social protection and data collection (statistics and indicators).

FEANTSA prepares regular policy documents on relevant issues based on the results of transnational exchange. Both these reports and the resulting policy statements are available on the website and through the FEANTSA office in Brussels.

Contacts

Freek Spinnewijn, Director
FEANTSA
194 Chaussée de Louvain
B-1210 Brussels

Tel: +32 2 538 66 69
Fax: +32 2 539 41 74

E.mail: office@feantsa.org

URL: http://www.feantsa.org/