‘The place where they took their first steps’: What YiSSA’s imminent closure will mean for families living there

By Pak Chan and Maximillian Lai

 

It was a Sunday afternoon when we arrived at YiSSA. The cockatoos roosting nearby begin to screech deafeningly as some residents come out to sit on the grass outside the gates to relax as the sky turns orange. With a fitted sheet as their picnic mat, Frances Daingangan and her family enjoy their dinner, as children around them ride around in scooters and a little plastic tricycle. For many of the younger residents living here, it is the first place they’ve ever seen.

We too sat down on the grass, introducing ourselves to her. Ms Daingangan began to tell us her story, and then she pointed to a little girl sitting behind the fence. “That’s my granddaughter… she’s about six,” she said.

“Kids are born, they’re raised here. They took their first step around here and [YiSSA] is a home for the[se] new generations.”

Ms Daingangan has been living at YiSSA for five years since fleeing domestic violence together with her daughters from the remote East Arnhem community of Milingimbi.

Still on the waitlist for public housing when we last spoke in August, she was forced to remain at the short-stay accommodation without another option for a permanent home.

Born in 1963, Ms Daingangan is a nationally recognised educator, translator and actress. But because of violence and gossiping, she said, she was forced to leave the home she once loved.

“The problem [with the community] was just violence, people fighting… lies… but out here, I find it’s a good place [sic].”

But not every resident at YiSSA is an established educator or community leader. Everyday people like Lolita, who asked not to be shown on camera, are also among YiSSA’s residents. Lolita suffers from renal failure and was forced to move out of home to access regular dialysis. YiSSA is where she and her children have now been made to live.

But Lolita’s story is not an uncommon one at YiSSA. According to long-term residents, many have moved here to access healthcare or to flee from domestic violence with their children.

Now, however, residents are facing another uncertainty: where they will go next. In July this year, the NT Government announced that negotiations with YiSSA’s managing company, AUSCO, had failed. The Minister for Children and Families Robyn Cahill claimed that the price AUSCO wanted for the acquisition of land, reportedly 6.5 million dollars, was ‘too high’. And in mid-September, the Government announced that it will provide ‘transitional accommodation’ for residents moving out of YiSSA located at Batchelor, which is close to 90 kilometers away from the original site, and takes more than an hour to travel back into the Darwin city area.

And amidst the fear of eviction, many residents say they are left in the dark about the deals and negotiations that are taking place between AUSCO and the government.

Rose Laynbalaynba is also an elder from Milingimbi. But due to most of her work as an educator and translator being in Darwin, she moved to YiSSA to save costs on travelling. She told the Student Spotlight that many residents are left in the dark about the deal that is being negotiated.

“[The politicians] don’t come and talk to the residents here… they’re not letting us know [about the negotiations],” she said. “We’re not [even] given a reason why YiSSA is being demolished…[The Government] said ‘you people need to go home’. Go back home where?”

“We are being moved and asked to evacuate as if we are refugees.”

In late August, the Federal Minister for Indigenous Affairs Malarndirri McCarthy announced that the federal government was offering the NT Government 3.5 million dollars out of the total 6.5 million, to keep YiSSA open under conditions that will see the managing corporation, Yili Housing, continuing to run the accommodation for at least another five years.

Less than a week later, however, Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro has rejected the offer, saying the cost is still too high for taxpayers.

The dispute comes as the Territory faces significant financial pressure with the 2026-2027 NT budget forecasting non-financial public-sector net debt to reach approximately $12.56 billion, with an expected deficit of more than $1.06 billion. The Territory Government has argued that purchasing YiSSA’s ageing infrastructure for more than its assessed value would be an irresponsible use of public money.

Elders at YiSSA have been pleading for more federal support, as Ms Laynbalaynba called for the Prime Minister to visit YiSSA and speak to the residents.

“The NT Government can pay three million dollars,” she said, “The Prime Minister … can pay three million dollars… he throws 10 million all around, but then forgets First Nations people.”

“We need this hostel at least to help our children go to school,”

Following the Government’s announcement about an alternative accommodation in Batchelor, the Student Spotlight has put forward multiple questions to the minister’s office regarding children who require transport to get to school, and patients on dialysis who require transport to access treatment.

None of the questions put forward in an email was answered as of the publication deadline.

Since the Student Spotlight last spoke to Ms Daingangan, ABC News has reported that she has been given priority government housing, allowing her to move out of the accommodation with her granddaughter. But not every resident at YiSSA is as lucky as her. For those who are yet to find a place to stay, they face an unsettling wait for help as their only options are to move away to a rurual part of Darwin, or to face the prospect of homelessness.