The municipal administration of Piacenza intervenes on the topic of the participatory path linked to the new general urban plan. “It is one of the most important and complex participation initiatives ever implemented – he states -, the work of an Administration is to mediate by trying to achieve various objectives that must necessarily coexist: environmental sustainability, but also social and economic sustainability. In other words, the Administration cannot work by taking into account only some requests while ignoring others. In even simpler words: the Administration certainly cannot write the Plan under the dictation of some. This is not participation.” Below is the full speech
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The path that is leading to the drafting of the general urban plan of Piacenza represents without fear of contradiction one of the most important and complex participation initiatives ever implemented by the municipal administration. And not only from the current one, but absolutely. Just to immediately clarify the concept in question with a numerical figure, just think that if the law (and in particular article 45, paragraph 8 of Law 24 which regulates Participation) provides for the obligation that the Municipalities organize only one meeting per illustrate Pug’s proposals once assumed by the municipal councils and leaves the administrations themselves free to organize any further participatory moments before the assumption, well the Municipality of Piacenza has promoted or participated to date in more than thirty events including meetings, workshops, visits guided tours, council commissions and meetings of the Environment and Territory Council. There are Municipalities that have limited themselves to organizing the only meeting required by law after the adoption of the Plan proposal by the Council.
Never so much participation, therefore, also in terms of the “ongoing” sharing of the various documents (all uploaded practically in real time on the municipal website, in the specific section dedicated to the Pug) and in terms of the extension to the proposals and considerations by individual citizens, associations and stakeholders via an ad hoc e-mail address. It is necessary to clarify what is meant by participation. And to do this, once again, numbers help: 100 associations participated in the workshop last February 25, 2023 at the “Casa del Piano” or at Palazzo Farnese. And all these associations have brought requests that must find answers in the drafting of the Plan and, consequently, the work of an Administration is to mediate by trying to achieve various objectives that must necessarily coexist: environmental sustainability, but also social and economic sustainability. In other words, the Administration cannot work by taking into account only some requests while ignoring others. In even simpler words: the Administration certainly cannot write the Plan under the dictation of some. This is not participation.
Returning to the participatory path, the “Towards the Pug” phase included a number of completely extraordinary events, activities and opportunities for participation, and all this before the adoption of the Plan proposal. Furthermore, a questionnaire was submitted to citizens which had an exceptional response compared to the size of our city: 910 responses. Consider, as a point of comparison, that a similar questionnaire in Bologna, a regional capital city with four times the population of Piacenza, collected 500 responses. As part of this process, the “Let’s light up the Pug” phase made it possible to open the doors of abandoned places, not only owned by the Municipality but also by the State Property Office and by Cassa Depositi e Prestiti: on the one hand a unique opportunity for citizens who participated and, on the other hand, an operation that was certainly not easy to organize for the municipal offices which had to interface with other bodies, whose availability made it possible to plan the seven guided tours of the past months.
Now, just to close the circle of what the complex participatory path in question provides, the “Let’s share the Pug” phase opens. A phase that includes a meeting already scheduled for next July 3rd in Sant’Ilario with the presentation of the socio-demographic data and the housing offer in the Piacenza area, and a further and fundamental meeting that will be scheduled shortly and which will see the presentation of Pug’s proposal by the consultants who have worked in recent months and in the presence of the mayor Katia Tarasconi and the councilor for urban planning Adriana Fantini. A meeting that will represent a moment of sharing and debate and which, it should be specified, will take place in the phase even before the adoption of the Plan proposal by the Council and will be a further opportunity for participation in which those present will be able to attend the illustration of the contents and strategies of the new Pug which will outline the development of Piacenza until 2050. All this, as already underlined, before the proposed Plan is adopted by the Council. Which will happen by the end of July. After which the law provides that the same proposal be published in the Burert (the official bulletin of the Emilia-Romagna Region) and remain there for 60 days during which anyone with observations can present them. And in this regard, it should be noted that the Administration, precisely to encourage the widest participation, has already decided that after the acceptance of Pug’s proposal by the end of July, it will publish the proposal itself on Burert in September (and not immediately , as he could do); this is also to allow those who may be on holiday in August to have the time necessary to read, study and subsequently submit observations.
