Homelessness is just one of many serious challenges that Albania’s LGBT+ community faces.
Discrimination and violence from family members and the community are prevalent. STREHA believes that LGBT+ youth should not have to choose between having a safe home and living their true lives.
Our services include a safe and supportive living environment for a period of up to one-year, medical assistance, individual therapy, career counseling and vocational training, employment assistance, legal assistance, family mediation, and recreational activities.
STREHA supports LGBTI+ young people:
- By offering a safe shelter for a stable period of time.
- By offering self-empowering and re-integration services for residents and community members outside Tirana.
- By enhancing the societal awareness on LGBTI+ cause.
In 2023 alone, we provided accommodation for a total of 2188 bednights and a wide range of multi-disciplinary onsite and distant services.
Our list of self-empowering and re-integration services includes:
- Individual development plans.
- Psycho-social support.
- Career counseling.
- Group therapy…
- Referrals to specialised services.
- Mental health and wellbeing supervision.
- Support with expenses during reintegration.
- Guidance towards employment and professional formation.
- Support in mediation of relationships with family members.
- Inclusion and participation in community-building activities.
We have a supportive team of Young Ambassadors, consisting of former residents of Streha who are now successfully integrated as empowered members of the society.
We share our expertise through various local and national projects and are actively supporting the enlargement and establishment of other shelters in the region. Our experts have previously assisted activists from North Macedonia and are currently closely collaborating with partners in Kosovo for the establishment of the first residential shelter for LGBTI+ people in Prishtina, a shelter which will adhere to our residential standards.
Streha’s residential standards have been recognized by ministerial decree as nationwide standards for the establishment and management of shelters providing services with a focus on LGBTI+ people.
