L’AQUILA – “Over 37 million for cultural events from 2017 to 2023. 2026 will be an important year, L’Aquila Capital of Culture is a great joy, but also a great commitment. As oppositions, we have been asking since March to have a discussion in the Third Commission to understand what we intend to do and to give our contribution. We don’t want another boomerang effect like the Year of Mercy miraculously granted by Pope Francis and not valued at all. And we don’t want the important funds, which will still arrive, to be used without a strategy. We must look to the future, to the young generations and we must ensure that something remains in the area.”
That’s how he started out Stefania Pezzopanemunicipal councilor of the Democratic Party, in the press conference promoted by the center-left on the funds spent in L’Aquila from 2017 to 2023. The other opposition councilors were also present at the conference, Alessandro Tomassoni, Enrico Verini, Paolo Romano, Lorenzo Rotellini, Gianni Padovani.
“The commission for a discussion on the capital of culture has finally been convened by President Frullo for May 21st – said Pezzopane – There we will discuss and make our proposals for a true and profound involvement of the territory. The city must have its own strategic, international project, for a strong positioning of the city in the cultural system. Culture is often used as a space for personal propaganda with excessive use of resources, rather than for overall cultural growth, educational poverty grows while the funds spent on entertainment increase. The GSSI and the MAXXI in L’Aquila were desired, decided and financed by the centre-left and were part of a precise plan for the cultural relaunch of the city with a new mission and we measure the positive effects every day with continuity over the years”.
“But since 2017 – he added – we have seen a rush towards mere events, which are increasingly expensive, in which the expenses for mega stages and complex logistics such as the structure for ‘The construction sites of the imagination’ now being assembled in July with significant costs have increased enormously. . Huge sums have been committed from 2017 to 2023. A good €37,806,463, of which €24,627,725 are contributions financed by the State thanks to the laws made by the centre-left, with Restart and then with the Earthquake Complementary Fund. Figures that no city in Italy has available and which the center-left had directed towards cultural, social and economic reconstruction and overcoming inequalities. But these missions don’t seem to have been successful, lots of money but to some extent to some, with entire territories abandoned. L’Aquila deserves a strategic project that goes beyond 2026, so many resources cannot be spent in an extemporaneous manner, when theatres, cinemas and other cultural structures are left at a standstill”.
Councilor Alessandro Tomassoni (Il Passo Possibile) added: “Culture is the identity of our city, boasting a very important tradition in the theatrical and musical fields, it must be even more so with the opportunity of 2026, not to be wasted to give it further five years, with events, but also with the recovery of the many buildings of architectural value, thus contributing to a definitive acceleration of the reconstruction of our social fabric and with an important spin-off that will certainly have a positive effect on the entire L’Aquila area and beyond. We must be ready to do our best and give an opportunity to everyone, perhaps favoring our local realities and taking into account the many characteristics of the operators in this area: the FUS bodies, the historical institutions, which have been working in the territory in culture for at least 20 years, but also the new cultural associations established for at least 5 years, the amateur choirs, the bands, and all those that have reason to be placed at the center of the proposals, not benefiting many of the ministerial funds; no reality must be left behind, particular attention must be paid, why not, to the associations with a youth component”.
“On infrastructure, it is good to have found the 5 million euros financed by the MIC Cohesion Fund for the ‘large projects’ (necessary after not having culpably intercepted the ad hoc PNRR funds for the recovery of places of culture), but to complete the Theater when will it actually be possible to proceed with awarding the works? Will the Municipality become the new contracting authority in place of the General Secretariat, as announced by Mayor Biondi? Certainly not in time for 2026, and we will have a deficit of cultural places in the Capital of Culture which is quite worrying if we are unable to change course and make an impact in the little time left until 2026. The San Filippo theatre, ready in 2017, when will it reopen? The impasse depends on the actual ownership of the property, which is not yet known whether it is still held by the Fund for Places of Worship (Fec), which is a branch of the Ministry of the Interior, or whether the passage of the definitive ownership of the property to the Municipality?”.
Councilor Enrico Verini (Action) also added: “I invite the mayor and the whole city to be ambitious. The opportunity of the capital of culture must be managed with ambition, opening up to all those who can make a quality contribution: I am talking about individual citizens of culture, associations, enlightened entrepreneurs, anyone who can contribute their experience. And we must be generous: this field must not be one of political conflict, we must collaborate and I ask the Mayor to open up to us minority councilors too. We know that this is the last call to bring L’Aquila back to its tradition that we lost after the earthquake. If we want back the culturally vibrant city we were, we have this one and last chance. If we miss it, we won’t have any more.”
Councilor Paolo Romano, on the same wavelength, said: “Despite the expenditure of 37 million euros, what continues to not emerge is the vision and planning of culture in the city. Indeed, the social objectives which were also the basis of the substantial funds linked to Restart have not only not been achieved but everything is done to hide them from the public debate: ‘sustainability in the long term’, ‘positive direct and indirect employment effects’, ‘ entrepreneurial development of the many creative activities already present in the urban system’ were and remain empty words. In this city, culture is used more for social campaigns to strengthen the national image of the mayor than to accompany a structural development of the economic-social system of our urban fabric”.
Councilor Lorenzo Rotellini also underlined the issue of use of funds: “Our objective must be to develop an idea of accessible and participatory culture in the city that can serve to reduce educational poverty in our territory. The 37 million spent from 2017 to today, often given to associations, do not “create” culture, they leave nothing for the future, you just need to concentrate on the spasmodic communication of how good you are, you need to roll up your sleeves to finish the reconstruction of all the places of culture, which have not seen the light of day since 2009 and to ensure that L’Aquila Capital of Culture 2026 is not a mere event factory for electoral purposes.”
Councilor Gianni Padovani (L’Aquila 99) added: “The problem is always the same: even on the subject of culture, any and all programming is lacking, a plan is lacking, a purpose is not perceived, and the huge resources available for cultural promotion (from 2017 to today and for the future more than 37 million euros!) have not been invested according to a plan logic, based on realistic and relevant objectives for the future development of the City. Even in the culture sector, the current Administration appears allergic to the basic concept of resource planning, and proceeds according to the convenient and discretionary logic of day-by-day, with spending in a rainstorm, dispersing the money in a thousand streams or following specific objectives simply incomprehensible, as in the case of the abnormal expenses for the stages dedicated to Perdonanza which cost more than double the costs of all the stages rented for the Spoleto International Festival. And yet after 15 years we still don’t have a cinema nor has the theater reopened: this is the thermometer of the quality of culture in the City”.
“The Administration must therefore discover the value of programming. The coat of arms of Capital of Culture must be a starting point, sharing with local associations and operators is necessary, with a flourishing of real long-term impacts on the territory. We cannot continue to use huge resources without a strategic plan, without the necessary infrastructure, without the involvement of intermediate bodies. Let’s not waste a great opportunity as we did with Sport: nothing permanent, long-lasting, structural followed the title of European City. In L’Aquila we were a European city of sport, but without facilities, let’s now avoid being the capital of culture, but without Culture, without looking to the future and without planning, living from day to day”.
The advisor Stefano Albano (Democratic Party) absent due to health problems, however he wanted to participate with his own contribution: “A disproportionate sum, which in recent years should have created the conditions to make culture in our city a real industry, capable of giving impetus to the local economy and create jobs. Instead, it was preferred to transform these resources into the administration’s electoral ATM, but when they are finished, in the absence of structural investments, we risk seeing a terrible weakening of L’Aquila’s cultural system”.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Download in PDF©
