Locked in Hastings public toilets: Hidden challenges of the newly homeless

Hera Winitana, supporting her sister Kathleen Ora Winitana, who was locked in the Hastings central city toilet block on Russell Street. Photo / Paul Taylor

When Kathleen Ora Winitana heard the lock on the public toilets click and the footsteps of a security guard walk away, she realised just how hard it was to be homeless.

Locked in the Hastings CBD public toilets. The thought of it is enough to make you laugh and cry at the same time. For a woman going through a rough time, it was both.

Winitana is one of a rarely-mentioned-of group of people in Hawke's Bay: the newly homeless.

Since the start of December she's called her car home. She was living with a friend until her friend got a notice to vacate premises and Winitana had nowhere to go.

Hastings is one of the country's worst-hit districts regarding shortage of housing.

On Thursday Minister of Housing Megan Woods and Associate Housing Minister Nanaia Mahuta will be making an announcement about the issue.

Winitana is 53, and she doesn't want to be a burden for her family or friends.

But being newly homeless brings new challenges. On Sunday night she decided to use the public toilets closest to the Hastings clock tower, not knowing they were about to close.

She left her phone in her car and walked past security guards to get in.

"They didn't see me, they had their backs to me."

Then she heard, without any warning, the locks turning.

"They didn't yell out 'is anyone there', before they locked it.

"So here I am standing in the toilets yelling out to anybody to let me out and because the toilets had bars across the door it felt like I was in jail."

A car went past with some women in it, and Winitana kept yelling to be let out.

"I'm yelling out let me out and waving my arms through the bars, the light was still on in the toilets, they looked at me and started pointing and laughing at me.

"I must have looked funny as. Anyway I'm still in there like an hour then this other security car comes along, I'm yelling and climbing the bars by then, they saw me and stopped and let me out."

She told the second set of security guards that the previous set mustn't have seen her.

"They should have called out 'anybody in there' but didn't. They should have checked.

"I am just so glad to be out of the situation. For me it was frustrating, just an honest mistake."

Hastings District Council regulatory solutions manager John Payne said a woman was accidentally locked in the toilets on Sunday night and let out soon after.

"We encourage her to come and talk with us if she has anything further she wants to discuss about the incident."

Hera Winitana, with her sister Kathleen Ora Winitana. Photo / Paul Taylor.

Winitana was by herself that night. Her family is spread across Hawke's Bay, including her seven kids, but she says they have enough to deal with.

"I live in my car, and chose to live in my car because I don't want to be a burden to my family. I am homeless because of shortage of housing and I am on the jobseekers benefit.

"I try to make the money last till next benefit day."

Winitana learned a lot about the homeless life in a week.

"I sit in the park in the morning, I get water from the library, I go to the public loos, and I buy cooked food because I can't cook."

During the day she reads her book and visits her family.

"At night I sleep in my car, sometimes when I get tired of sleeping in my car I go to my family.

"My family are really supportive."

Living in her car is a stressful situation for her to be in, she says.

"I mainly try and park somewhere they can't see me."

She says she's trying to save some of her benefit each week. Her family owns a parcel of land at Waimarama and she plans to save to buy a caravan that she can put on it.

In the interim she intends to keep moving.

"I move around a lot, it's easier to move."