We don’t know if it was due to carelessness in the positioning of the gates. conviction or if someone told them that vehicles with foreign license plates have “the green disc” to pass through the center or in the Sassi districts, outside the permitted hours, but the fact remains that the debt collection operation launched by the Municipality of Matera I point the finger at the transgressors from across the border. 70 percent of the fines imposed by the Municipality of Matera for violations of limited traffic zones come from vehicles with foreign license plates. This is what the mayor Domenico Bennardi and the local police councilor Giuseppe Digilio reported in a note, which refer to the period September 2023 April 2024 based on the data provided by a company with an agreement for debt collection. The total collection of fines is approximately 600,000 euros. Well. But we believe that an extra effort should be made, and this is an objective fact, on the signs approaching the gates. The biggest inconvenience is accessing the Sassi. Those who, for example, arrive at the gate to Barsiano in via D’Addozio (Sant’Agostino) from via Santo Stefano will find the gate in front of them, immediately after turning right. So someone stops and reverses. Others continue and get fined. Patience…Patience?
PRESS RELEASE
Stop crafty people with foreign license plates and drivers of foreign cars who don’t pay fines. The Municipality of Matera is recovering all the evaded sums.
Since September 2023, the municipal administration of Matera has started a zero-cost agreement for the institution with a company specialized in debt collection, to collect the fines imposed on citizens residing abroad. The mayor, Domenico Bennardi, gave the news with the local police councilor Giuseppe Digilio. A decision that proved to be productive and strategic, because according to the latest data acquired from September 2023 to April 2024, 70% of the proceeds from fines for violating the Limited Traffic Zone come from this recovery on foreign license plates. Added to this is a lower percentage for parking restrictions and some other infringements. On the one hand this means that the majority of fines for ZTL gates are attributable to foreign citizens, on the other hand that the majority of fines imposed in the city do not concern Italian drivers or resident citizens.
«Clear proof – Bennardi and Digilio point out – that there is no repressive system of the local police on resident citizens, because it is not in our interest to fuel a punitive system, but to always collaborate with citizens. For this reason, the use of telelaser in the city has been greatly reduced; we have installed speed detectors (simple dissuaders) near the urban areas downgraded from 50 km/h to 30 limits, and regarding Ztl we have installed much more evident and clear signage. The fact of the majority of fines to foreign citizens for the ZTL – continue the administrators – comforts us because it also means that the people of Matera are more virtuous. In this regard, as the summer season approaches, we urge everyone to collaborate more, avoiding congesting traffic during rush hours, also through the use of alternative mobility. Finally, we thank the local police offices and the command for the excellent work carried out also with respect to this activity of recovering sums evaded abroad”.
Matera, 18 June 2024
