The Council of State confirms the expiry of state concessions for beaches on 31 December 2023, thus obliging the administrations to disapply any exceptions on 31 December 2024,
The Council of State refers “to the principles of the EU Court of Justice” to “immediately start the tender procedure to assign the concession in a truly competitive context”.
In simple terms, the Council of State is against the so-called tacit renewal of licenses but requests that there be the possibility of being able to assign licenses through a tender procedure. According to the Council of State, this would serve to “protect” the beach resource which, as underlined in the sentence, is “scarce”
He intervenes on the issue the president of the Sicilian seaside tourist association Antonello Firullo which highlights how there are contradictions.
“First of all-explains Firullo-the Council of State cannot say that the resources are not there. In fact, the Meloni government has done the mapping and it turns out that 67% of the beaches in Italy are free. In Sicily alone we reach around 20% (12% only for beach establishment activities).
We are confident- continues President Firullo– as the Regional Government confirmed the extension to 31 December 2024. In 2019, the Sicily Region in fact took the national law which tacitly extended the concessions and modified it completely, forcing us concessionaires to present a formal request for extension, to a new preliminary investigation process also obliging us to guarantee an insurance guarantee for the guarantee of the fee until 2033, regularity of the Durc, preliminary investigation costs and addition of 30% of the state property fee, therefore at the conclusion of the preliminary investigation process, only if everything corresponds to the requests from the region and if it is in order, a new concession title is formulated which is registered at the Palermo registry office and published on the site.
This is a procedure that has not been done in the rest of Italy. We are therefore perfectly in line with what the judges of the Council of State say and for this reason we ask for confirmation of the validity of the state concessions as of 31 December 2033 and the cancellation of communications, forwarded electronically, to the concessionaires of the maritime state property of Sicily which validate “the effectiveness of the maritime state concessions as of 31 December 2023”
Firullo reassures the Sicilian seaside resorts that he has obtained clear information directly from the Brussels offices on the fact that Europe has never asked the Italian Government to give a deadline to the concessions, a request made by the Council of State, much less to issue tenders and the races, but only “that all concessions have public evidence”
However, Firullo underlines that”also on this aspect there is little clarity because public evidence is requested but no directives are given on how to do it.
We in the province of Ragusa and throughout Sicily– concludes Firullo- we will continue to work without being intimidated by anyone. We must not forget that we have given the quality to the beaches, fixing up areas that were abandoned and providing services such as lifesaving, or beach cleaning, to give some examples, which not even the Municipalities, although obliged, are able to guarantee. We are the sentinels of the beaches”
