Long waiting time

City sees need for action in visit accompaniment

Mitju" has toys and books for different age groups.(Bild: KJH/ Wolfram Günther)

The City of Salzburg once again draws attention to the urgent need to improve the situation with regard to visitation support. City Councillor Andrea Brandner emphasizes: "Safeguarding the best interests of the child is a central task. Additional resources at federal level alone, as called for by Provincial Councillor Christian Pewny, will not be enough."

Currently, the waiting time for visitation support is around six months. This means that children are unable to have contact with a separated parent for this long period of time if visitation supervision has been prescribed - an untenable situation. In the city and province of Salzburg, only the 'Rainbows' association currently offers this service, which leads to considerable bottlenecks. 

Visiting café as a short-term aid facility
In order to provide a short-term remedy, the city of Salzburg has set up the "Mitju" visiting café on a voluntary basis. This gives at least some families the opportunity to make use of professionally supervised visiting support. City Councillor Brandner commented: "Children should not have to go months without contact with a parent. We have created a solution with the 'Mitju' visiting café, but this can only be a temporary solution. The state is called upon to exercise its responsibility and take action. The welfare of the children must come first." 

Brandner hopes for constructive cooperation in order to improve the situation of the families affected and to do justice to the best interests of the child.

What is 'Mitju'?
The 'Mitju' ("meet you") visiting café is a place where visiting support for parents and their child/children is offered by specialists. They are there to answer questions and make sure that the children are doing well. In this way, we help to make visits conflict-free and independent in the future, even after a separation.