Only 14 days to present yourself to the Sicilian Region with executive, solid and convincing projects to spend the approximately 4 million euros made available for Capital of Culture 2025.
If only last Wednesday the first “Programmatic Conference” was held, convened by the Municipality and the 2025 Foundation to “fuel the debate and preliminary discussion on everything relating to the advent of the year of ‘Agrigento Italian Capital of Culture 2025′” , in exactly two weeks the list of executive projects will need to be placed on the table of the structure created in recent months by the Region.
A peremptory deadline (considering that the first date identified was already mid-May), which cannot contain “ideas”, but maximum concreteness. “The projects of the initiatives – we read in the decree which had set the aims and deadlines – must be drawn up and approved according to the methods established by the current legislation” they will then be subjected to “evaluation of the coherence and verification of the technical-administrative procedures by the regional Department of Cultural heritage”.
Only afterwards will a specific agreement be stipulated aimed at regulating relations between the department and the Municipality of Agrigento for the implementation phase with respect to the timetable of operations, the possible redetermination of the contribution and the methods of disbursement of the sums, but also the monitoring methods and control.
But the money can be used for what? “The initiatives – says the Region – will be characterized by a high and recognized level”. All expenses related to the holding of the events in question are eligible, from promotion to simple service activities, transport and insurance of exhibited cultural assets, payment of artists, etc.
It is difficult to think that the many ideas gathered during the city conference will be able to be translated into “cooked and eaten” projects, so many think that, probably, the city’s listening phase could have started much earlier. It should be noted that we are not talking about the projects already included in the dossier (total cost of six million euros) but about extra initiatives that still need to be thought about and planned.
What is certain is that the foundation has not yet solved its problems. The absence from the conference of the moderator who had been announced, i.e. the (eternally) in pectore general director Roberto Albergoni, was not overlooked, formally attributed to a malaise but in reality due to profound disagreements within the structure created to manage funds and projects of one of the most important events for the city in recent decades. It seems that only this week will the designer formally have his much announced role (he had been appointed in February), even if everything is currently on hold until the Municipality of Agrigento transfers economic resources to the foundation, which in fact is currently a empty box.
“Day one” of Capital of Culture 2025 is less than six months away. And, according to some, everything is fine.
