The fire ordinance published just two days after it came into force. Is it the fault of the Municipality? Of the region? Contributory negligence? Regardless, bureaucracy is to blame and the ones who pay are the environment, decorum, safety and community.
THE MUNICIPAL ORDINANCE
It happens in Trani (but perhaps also elsewhere) whose mayor, Amedeo Bottaro, only yesterday, 13 June, signed and published the forest fire prevention ordinance for the year 2024, which provides that owners, tenants and/or managers of any kind of rustic funds, lands and areas of any nature, and their appurtenances, clear them of brushwood and do the same with the roadsides facing the areas. The bulk of the work, obviously, is what is done by June 15th, but the provision also orders regular and periodic cleaning and maintenance of the grounds themselves until September 15th.
Everything as expected, it seems, but this time the union order arrived only two days before the deadline to comply with it. And this objectively places both private individuals and the Municipality itself (as well as any other public body), owners of many uncultivated areas, in the condition of objective impossibility of making them safe due to lack of technical time. So what happened for the mayor to arrive so late, issuing a provision which is also annual, never changes and therefore simply has to be re-proposed almost in copy and paste?
THE REGIONAL DECREE
Well, it happened that, by law, the union ordinance must refer to a decree issued by the president of the regional council, and precisely this year this decree (which the ordinance formally recalls) saw the light with considerable delay compared to those past: the governor, Michele Emiliano, signed it on 7 June and, consequently, the Municipality of Trani (and perhaps not only him), due to the concomitant commitments that distracted the staff, in particular the European elections, is not was placed in a position to adopt the appropriate ordinance in time to be signed by the mayor. In other words, the Region has come a long way and the Municipality has come a long way.
The fact remains that «with the summer season – we also read in the provision of the head of the Apulian executive – the risk resulting from possible fires of stubble, weeds and shrubs of all kinds increases. The state of abandonment in which some rustic properties, lands or areas of any nature and their appurtenances find themselves could cause serious damage to public safety, roads, public and private properties and productive activities present in the municipal territory, as well as to the native fauna”.
And therefore «it is necessary to preserve the infrastructures responsible for the management of transport services, road networks, electricity, gas, water from the damage that could be caused to them by forest fires or other types of fire originating from the neglect and degradation of neighboring rural areas , as well as the adoption of functional practices for cultivation which involve the burning of vegetables”.
VIRTUOUS BAT
At this point, the risk of fires developing increases proportionally to the delay in intervening. Very few have independently reclaimed their land before the deadline. And among these we can mention the Province of Barletta Andria Trani which, without waiting for banks from Bari, put its hand in its wallet and, with 5,000 euros, had the enormous uncultivated area around the former psycho-pedagogical institute between Trani and Bisceglie reclaimed, putting it into safety.
But they are exceptions to a rule that follows the classic Italian practice for which it is difficult to move unless some authority orders to do so. And so, in the absence of the ordinance, it goes without saying that no one has bothered to make their land safe, as if this should always and solely depend on a provision coming from above and not on the typical reasoning of a good father. family’s.
THE APPREHENSIONS
And in the meantime, apprehensions begin about particularly at-risk land such as the municipal one in via Falcone, where an important telephone company is installed, or that of Capirro – the largest of all – owned by the Vittorio Emanuele II personal services company , which has always lacked funds to proceed with its plowing independently. And, when that area catches fire, the neighboring residents are always very afraid.
