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The Buenos Aires City Court is calling on transgender and transvestite people to join a collective legal action demanding priority access to housing subsidies. According to the court order, the deadline to join the petition is mid-month.

The measure stems from a presentation made by the public defender, Pablo de Giovanni, on behalf of four trans women living in overcrowded conditions at the Hotel Gondolín , located in the Villa Crespo neighborhood of Buenos Aires. “This action sought to include all trans people in the city who face difficulties accessing housing, which is many, if not almost all,” the defender told Presentes, “so that the government will dedicate a special policy to them and include them as a priority group for the subsidies the government provides to people experiencing homelessness.”

The judge who handled the injunction ruled that the measure could only apply to the four plaintiffs. An appeal was filed, and the Court of Appeals indicated that the injunction applied to all of them and referred the case to Judge Andrés Gallardo, who had ordered the issuance of the summons.

[READ ALSO: Shelter, health and dignity for Noemí: the court ruled in favor of a trans woman]

The Ombudsman explained that this subsidy is restricted to people of working age. Priority is given to older people, those with minor children, or those with disabilities. However, the trans and gender-diverse community is not given priority despite the discrimination they face, their low life expectancy, and the significant difficulty they encounter in entering the labor market.

“This is a first step: to summon all the people who want to come forward so that it is considered a collective protection, in the sense that it is for a group of people and that a collective right must be protected, which in this case is non-discrimination,” Di Giovanni emphasized.

A collective process

Lawyer and activist Greta Pena, president of 100% Diversity and Rights, celebrated the court ruling, stating that it “confirms that the omission of public policies is also discrimination. The State does nothing specifically to address the problem of decent housing for the trans population. It is also very promising that it recognizes this as a collective process, which legitimizes civil society organizations and whose consequences will not only be individual,” she added.

[READ ALSO: The courts ordered the regulation of a transgender employment quota in Buenos Aires City]

Lara María Bertolini, a trans activist, law student, and employee at the Directorate of Territorial Agencies for Access to Justice (ATAJO) of the National Public Prosecutor's Office, explained that trans people are often denied housing subsidies because they are involved in prostitution, because of their gender identity, because they are migrants, or because they lack receipts from their precarious rental properties. "This request is to highlight the extreme vulnerability in which trans and travesti people live," she stated.

A situation that is getting worse

According to the research “The butterfly revolution, 10 years after the feat of the proper name” , improvements in housing conditions since 2005 (the year the book was published under the coordination of activist Lohana Berkins) and after the sanction of the Gender Identity Law “are null or worsened”.

[READ ALSO: Shelter, health and dignity for Noemí: the court ruled in favor of a trans woman]