Budget law, Milleproroghe, conversion of Decree Pnrr: in recent weeks the Government has allocated and disciplined the use of huge resources, crucial for determining the trend of the economic situation of the year just started and of those to come. What is the role played by local authorities in this scenario? How many of those resources will have to be managed directly by them and for what purpose?
According to what emerged from the research conducted by the Centro Studi Local Entities (CSEL) for time.news, the treasury of the municipalities deriving from the combined provisions of the 3 measures mentioned, amounts overall – for 2022 alone – to approximately 2.6 billion EUR. A figure that increases considerably if we look at the following years because in many cases the commitments already undertaken by these maneuvers are characterized by a progressive increase that leads today to foresee the arrival in the coffers of the Italian municipalities, of 2.7 billion in 2023, a little less than 3.3 billion in 2024, 2.8 billion in 2025, 3.4 billion in 2026 and 2027, 3.5 in 2028, 3.6 in 2029 and 3.5 in 2030.
PUBLIC WORKS: an important item of the package of measures entrusted to the Italian municipalities, which overall amounts to just under one billion for 2022, is represented by the public works chapter.
SCHOOL: The sums committed also on the school front are very significant, but the bulk of the disbursements are scheduled for the years to come. It starts in 2022 with 120 million (between modification of allotment criteria and increase in the Municipal Solidarity Fund) to be used to remove territorial imbalances in the provision of the nursery service and gradually increasing figures are committed for the years to come: 175 million for 2023, 230 for 2024, 300 million for 2025, 450 million for the year 2026 and 1,100 million per year starting from 2027. These sums will have to be used to increase the percentage, within the limit of the resources available for each year, number of places in the educational services for children, up to the achievement of a minimum level that each municipality or territorial basin is required to guarantee.
The municipalities, individually or in association, must ensure the achievement of the essential level of performance through annual service objectives. From this year, the service target by demographic bracket of the municipality or the territorial basin to which it belongs is set by Decree of the Minister of the Interior, giving priority to the most disadvantaged territorial basins and taking into account a maximum threshold of 28.88% , valid until all disadvantaged municipalities have achieved an equal level of performance. The service target is progressively increased annually until reaching, in 2027, the minimum guaranteed level of 33% on a local basis, also through the private service. These money can also be used by the municipalities to hire the staff necessary for the direct management of educational services for children.
On paper there is also a heavy commitment: 4.3 billion for extraordinary maintenance interventions, safety measures, new construction, increase in energy efficiency and internal wiring of the schools of the provinces and metropolitan cities. However, the resources should be materially disbursed between 2024 and 2036.
ENVIRONMENT: Relevant, also in line with the commitments undertaken with the NRP, the amount of resources, the management of which involves the municipalities, which are related to the environmental issue. This is 940 million in 2022 and the same number in 2023, but destined to increase progressively in the following years (990 in 2024, 1,040 in 2025, 1.1 billion in 2026). The bulk is attributable to the Italian Climate Fund, which will finance interventions, including grants, in favor of private and public entities to contribute to the achievement of the objectives established in the international agreements on climate and environmental protection to which Italy has joined.
However, it should also be noted the creation of the Fund for the Sustainable Mobility Strategy to fight climate change and reduce emissions, with a total budget of 2 billion, of which 50 million for each of the years from 2023 to 2026, 150 million for 2027 and 2028, 200 million for the year 2029, 300 million for 2030 and 250 million for each of the years from 2031 to 2034. The declared objective is to strengthen existing measures and the adoption of new initiatives in terms of sustainable mobility and, in particular, the climate, energy and fuel, transport, construction, land use and forestry sectors. The main measures will concern: the renewal of the bus fleet, the cycle paths, the renewal of road transport vehicles and the development of intermodal freight transport.
A contribution has also been made for the metropolitan cities of Genoa, Milan, Naples, Rome and Turin, aimed at promoting the sustainability of urban mobility, also through the extension of the underground and rapid mass transport, including design activities, and the purchase or renewal of rolling stock. The financial envelope envisaged for the expenditure in question is 50 million for each of the years 2022 and 2023, 100 million for 2024, 200 million for 2025, 250 million for 2026, 300 million for 2027, 350 million for 2028 and 300 million for each of the years from 2029 to 2036.
CULTURE: Fund for culture refinanced with 20 million euros for each of the years from 2022 to 2023. This is aimed at promoting investments and interventions for the protection, conservation, restoration, use, enhancement and digitization of Heritage cultural material and immaterial.
DIGITIZATION: the endowment of the Fund for technological innovation and digitization has been extended by 5 million for 2022, 10 million for 2023 and 20 for 2024. The interventions towards which these sums will be addressed must guarantee a strategy for sharing and using the public information assets for institutional purposes, the dissemination of digital identity, digital domicile and electronic signatures, the creation and provision of online services, access to online services through the enabling platforms (Spid, Cie, AppIO, PagoPA ), and Cyber Security.
IMMIGRATION: 90 million euros will also be invested in the next 3 years to create 2,000 new places to accommodate Afghan asylum seekers in the Reception and Integration System. Coming to the Municipalities of Lampedusa and Linosa, Porto Empedocle, Pozzallo, Caltanissetta, Vizzini, Messina, Siculiana, Augusta, Pantelleria and Trapani, 1.5 million to meet the needs related to the containment of the spread of Covid 19 and ensure regular management also of a health nature, of migratory flows.
ISSUE OF GENDER: The Fund for policies relating to rights and equal opportunities 2022 increased by 17 million euros. Starting from the following year, an annual increase of 50 million euros in the fund to support gender pay equality is also envisaged.
PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT: The Pnrr Decree allocates a total of 150 million for the five-year period 2022-2026 (30 million per year) for the administrative strengthening of the municipalities in the form of a contribution to cover the burden incurred by municipalities with a population of less than 5,000 inhabitants for temporary hires determined by way of derogation useful for the administrative strengthening of the municipal offices for the implementation of the Plan.
SOCIAL: Expected for the year just started 270 million euros managed directly by the local social bodies, aimed above all at implementing actions aimed at improving the living conditions of people with disabilities (30 million for the school transport of disabled students who are not self-employed, 100 for assistance with autonomy and communication for pupils with disabilities, an increase of 27 million in the fund for subjects with autism spectrum disorder and by 50 million in that for the inclusion of people with disabilities). In addition, the fund for non self-sufficient people has been strengthened with a further 15 million and a new fund for projects for the cohabitation of the elderly has been established, with a budget of 5 million euros for 2021.
FUND FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF ITALIAN MOUNTAINS: Interventions of extraordinary maintenance, safety measures, new construction, energy efficiency increase and internal wiring of schools in provinces and metropolitan cities
LEGALITY AND PROTECTION OF LOCAL ADMINISTRATORS VICTIMS OF INTIMIDATORY ACTS: To respond to the constant increase – repeatedly denounced by the Interior Ministry – in the number of intimidating episodes against mayors, councilors and municipal and metropolitan councilors, the financial maneuver established the “Fund for initiatives in favor of legality and for the protection of administrators local victims of intimidation “with an endowment of 5 million euros for each of the years from 2022 to 2024. Through these resources, the municipalities will have to take initiatives to promote legality and measures to restore the body’s assets or in favor of administrators premises that have suffered episodes of intimidation connected with the exercise of the institutional functions exercised.
For 2022, the CSEL notes, they have been put on the table 100 million euros to finance the extraordinary programs of extraordinary maintenance and functional adaptation and resilience to climate change of the road system under the responsibility of the Regions, Provinces and Metropolitan Cities. One item, the weight is set to rise in the years to come: 150 million in 2023, 200 in 2024 and 2025 and 300 from 2026 to 2034.
For investments for the extraordinary maintenance of municipal roads, sidewalks and street furniture, 300 million euros are foreseen (200 this year and 100 the next). Equally, 300 million euros was allocated to finance investments in urban regeneration projects aimed at reducing phenomena of marginalization and social degradation, as well as improving the quality of urban decor and the social and environmental fabric.
Increased to 350 million for the year 2023 and to 200 million for each of the years from 2024 to 2031, the financial endowment foreseen for the safety interventions of the territory at hydrogeological risk and of the roads and for the safety and energy efficiency of the schools, public buildings and municipal heritage.
Additional resources are also provided, compared to those foreseen in the first instance, for urban regeneration (an additional 500 million in the three-year period 2022-2024) and maintenance for the eco-sustainable reuse and refurbishment of public areas and public building structures, improvement of urban decor and social and environmental fabric (+272 million);
The funds for the collection and purification of water in emergencies related to disasters are also part of this package. Finally, the sums foreseen to guarantee the continuity of the interventions for the safety of the existing Bridges and Viaducts and the construction of new Bridges to replace the existing ones with structural safety problems are huge. However, these are commitments made for the future: in fact, we are talking about 100 million for the years 2024 and 2025 and 300 million for each of the years from 2026 to 2029.