Paros Blog
With your support, the Paros Housing, After-School & Vocational Center can be one step closer to being complete! This new building will house a second Debi Arach Children’s Center, a vocational training space, and a new social enterprise—bringing stability, opportunity, and hope to Gyumri’s most vulnerable families. We will also add a fourth floor creating 27 safe, permanent apartments for “domik” families still living in heartbreaking conditions. Funds needed to complete the building’s construction are secured through an anonymous contribution. Now funding is needed to furnish and equip the apartments and the second Debi Arach Children’s Center.
Project Timeline
In the spring of 2022, the Gyumri Municipality proposed giving Paros one of Gyumri’s half-constructed buildings with the purpose of Paros completing the building’s construction and housing “domik” families. In addition to the apartments, the building will allow Paros to open a second Debi Arach Children’s Center, additional vocational training programs and a second social enterprise. Following seismic evaluations, it was determined a fourth floor addition was feasible, creating a total of 27 apartments and expanding this project’s benefit.
The 1988 Spitak Earthquake caused the death of more than 35,000 people and left more than 100,000 people homeless. Armenia’s second largest city, Gyumri, was most affected by the earthquake. In the years that followed, Armenia’s Independence, the Artsakh War and corrupt regional and local officials contributed to a massive housing crisis, the inability to emerge from this housing shortage, and generational poverty in Gyumri. Today, almost 2,000 domiks are still “home” to people in Gyumri.
Concentrated Impact in Gyumri
Through housing initiatives to permanently reduce domik, or container living, afterschool programs that provide enrichment for the future generation, and vocational training that gives people the opportunity to provide, strides are being made to not only move forward, but to thrive forward.