The city councilors of the “Per La Nostra Crotone” group feel the duty to directly inform citizens about what is happening regarding the presence and management of asbestos in the area.
“In recent weeks – they write in a note – we had presented a detailed council question to ask for precise clarifications from the Mayor and the Council on various critical situations present in the city, starting from the area of the former Mercati Generali up to the center and the suburbs, and to find out the status of the Municipal Asbestos Plan and environmental monitoring. Unfortunately, the response received in the council chamber was completely unsatisfactory and without concrete confirmation of the questions posed. done, the Administration limited itself to waiting for citizens to self-report the presence of asbestos on their properties, forgetting that a Municipality has much more precise tasks.
Faced with this passive attitude – they continue – we have not stopped. We have formally filed a motion with the General Secretariat – pursuant to art. 32 of the City Council Regulations – to formally commit the Mayor and the Council to act according to the law and according to the precautionary principle. With this act we ask for clear commitments and certain deadlines: Drafting of the Municipal Asbestos Plan from scratch: the Municipality of Crotone, after years and unlike what is foreseen by national and regional legislation, has never equipped itself with this fundamental planning tool. We ask that it be prepared and brought to the Council within 90 days; Launch of the official census: the Authority cannot pass the responsibility on to private owners alone. It must activate its offices (Technical Office, Environment, Local Police) for a real reconnaissance of the territory, cross-referencing archives and reports; Active air monitoring with ASP and ARPACAL: close coordination with technical and health bodies so that periodic sampling and analyzes are carried out on the quality of the air we all breathe, especially near schools, homes, sports facilities and places frequented by citizens; Prevention of illegal abandonment and strengthening of controls: preparation of an extraordinary plan for the supervision of the districts, suburbs and abandoned areas, to stop illegal asbestos landfills in their tracks, which also provides for the strengthening of the Local Police staff through new hiring of agents dedicated to environmental controls, combining this with adequate information to citizens on the correct disposal procedures; Transparency: the creation of a dedicated section on the Municipality’s website where census data, maps and inspection results can be published.
“The protection of public health – they conclude – is not a bureaucratic detail nor an issue that can be postponed. We expect the Municipality to fully carry out the role of prevention and control that the law assigns to it. We will bring the motion to council debate, with the hope that it will be supported by all the majority municipal councilors because asbestos has no political power and the fibers make no distinction between right and left”.