«The sea is a common good, it is not a private good».
This is the subject of the letter that the municipal councilor Armando Foschi sent to the president of the Abruzzo regional council, Marco Marsilio, and to the commander of the port authority of Pescara, Fabrizio Giovannone.
The story is the one known for 4 years now of the access gate to the sea closed in Piazza le Laudi through the placing of a flower box by the manager of the “Lido delle Sirene” bathing establishment.
What seemed like a temporary closure over time has become permanent and after yet another winter, access to the beach is blocked again this summer. Access that had already been reduced to a minimum compared to the past due to the initiatives of bathers.
«Pescara has won the Blue Flag for the fourth time but, in the D’Annunzio pine forest of Pescara, more precisely in Piazza Le Laudi, the Blue flag is not flying», writes Foschi in the letter, «I am forced to return to the problem, remembering that: in Piazza Le Laudi there is a free access gate to the beach, 2.5 meters wide, foreseen by the municipal beach plan, by the regional maritime state property plan, reiterated in the Sid – maritime state property information system, between the Lido delle Sirene and La Playa concessions, a a gate which is also mandatory and necessary to guarantee passage to rescuers in case of emergencies, to beach users, to disabled citizens; In 2020, suddenly, that gap was closed with the use of planters, i.e. stone and marble vases with tall plants, creating both a physical and visual barrier, with the affixing of a sign with the logo of the “Lido delle Sirene” bathing establishment and the writing “Passage temporarily closed due to Covid-19″, Communication sent to the Municipality of Pescara and the port authority on 8 June 2020″; The passage remained closed also in the following winter period and, with the summer season – Year – 2021 approaching, citizens have forwarded several reports to the Municipality, the technical offices and the councilors, to ascertain the legitimacy of that closure”.
Then Foschi’s reconstruction of the facts continues as follows: «To give an exhaustive answer to the city, I personally asked a series of questions to the municipal administration through a question addressed to the pro tempore delegated councilor, Maria Rita Paoni Saccone who, through the manager of the Municipality’s planning service, Gaetano Silverii, responded to us in writing, making official, among other things, that “the offices of the Municipality of Pescara have never authorized the closure of the 2.5 meter gap, which occurred in alleged violation of the provisions of the regional maritime state property plan”, and further that “the verification of compliance with the rules and provisions, both in matters of state property and in health matters (Covid 19) falls to the administrations, bodies and offices that exercise the control and control functions supervision on the beach. It is up to them to verify the adequacy of the closure of the gate and the indication of the entry and exit routes from the concession with respect to the provisions of the regional maritime state property plan and the beach ordinances”; During the inspection carried out in Piazza Le Laudi by the Mobility and Security commission of the territory on 24/06/2021, it was possible to verify, in the presence of representatives of the local police, the continuation of the closure of the gate with the use of planters which they represent an insurmountable obstacle to the transit of users, who are therefore forced to cross and cross the two beach concessions to reach the beach, with a serious limitation on personal freedom. And on this occasion, the heavy and understandable discontent of the citizens present was recorded who claimed their right to go down to the coast simply by crossing the public gate whose presence must be guaranteed by law, without necessarily having to cross a private concession”.
«Given that», continues Foschi, «to date the municipal offices, it seems, have not in any way authorized the closure of the 2.5 meter gap, legally envisaged as mandatory by the municipal beach plan and by the Sid to guarantee the right free access to the beach for users, starting from the disabled, as well as for emergency vehicles; The closure of the gate is based exclusively on communications from a concessionaire who would have freely and independently carried out the closure in order to regulate entrances and exits on the beach, preventing free access which, according to him, would not have allowed him to guarantee compliance with the ministerial requirements for the management of the Covid-19 emergency; this consideration, however, would seem to be based on an erroneous assumption, since, on the basis of regional and ministerial provisions, each beach concessionaire is called upon to manage and regulate access to the beach under its own competence using exclusively the areas pertaining to its own concession, nor is it given the faculty or possibility of prohibiting the public from state-owned entry or exit gates outside the space of the individual concession; Even though, paradoxically, the closure measure had actually been adopted to deal with the Covid 19 emergency, it has now been declared concluded two years ago, thus eliminating the need to close the gate, or to regulate access on the beach in the areas subject to concession”.
Then Foschi recalls that on 28 June 2021 the city council unanimously voted on an agenda on the case but «to date, despite all the access to the beach continues to be prohibited for disabled people, the elderly, mothers with prams , to all vulnerable users and above all to any rescuers. A decisive intervention is requested on the part of the authorities in question, each within their competence, to verify what has been exposed and put an end to the probable abuse carried out”.
