Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

Milan, September 5 2019 – Insieme per ripulire le case popolari da scritte, scarabocchi e tag. Comune di Milano, MM e i Comitati Milanesi, rappresentati dal loro Coordinamento, hanno sottoscritto oggi a Palazzo Marino un accordo operativo per intervenire sui complessi di via Santi Ferdinando 6/8 e via Guido Coppin 3 (entrambi nel Municipio 6) e di via Nikolajevka 1/3/5 (Municipio 7). Si inizierà proprio da questo ultimo complesso, nella mattinata di sabato 28 settembre. MM e il Coordinamento dei Comitati Milanesi hanno aderito alla proposta del Comune riconoscendo lo spirito e le finalità del “Regolamento Comunale - Disciplina per la Partecipazione dei Cittadini Attivi alla Cura, alla Gestione Condivisa e alla Rigenerazione dei Beni Comuni Urbani”, di cui hanno accettato principi e disposizioni.

Signatories of the text which establishes an annual commitment, until June 2020, are the councilor for Participation, Active Citizenship and Open Data Lorenzo Lipparini, the director of the MM Home Division Corrado Bina and the vice-president of the Coordination of Milanese Committees, Fabiola Minoletti.

“Starting from the approval of the regulation for the shared administration of common goods, the collaboration agreements signed by active citizens with the Municipality have followed one another – declares councilor Lipparini -. Among the various interventions carried out, I am very happy to add this one, which concerns our public housing, even more significant because it will be carried out together with the citizens and those who live there and want to take an active part in improving the quality of life in the neighbourhoods".

Partner of the initiative will be Metropolitana Milanese which together with the Municipality has identified the buildings, repeatedly soiled, to be cleaned. All the material necessary for the volunteers' work will be provided: overalls, gloves, non-toxic cleaning material and paints, tools. Where individual associations do not have insurance coverage, the Municipality will provide it (accident cover and Civil Liability towards the Municipality and third parties). In this case, citizens who will carry out the activity will be asked to register in the "Register of active citizens", also established for this purpose. For the first time in this type of intervention, the recruitment of volunteers can take place through the "Volunteers Energy for Milan" platform and the citizens thus recruited will benefit from the insurance coverage connected to the program.

“Caring for common goods is in the very DNA of a company like MM, which deals with public works, public water and public housing – comments Corrado Bina, director of the MM Home Division –. We therefore enthusiastically join collaborative initiatives in which active citizenship, together with the public administration, contributes to making the neighborhoods of our city more beautiful and more liveable".

Together with the volunteers who will respond to the appeal, the cleaning and painting work will be carried out by those, around sixty, who are most assiduously part of the Coordination of the Milanese Committees, for over twenty years a point of reference and organization of numerous realities ready to participate, with a civic sense, in initiatives carried out for the good of the city.

“This type of ugliness not only affects the aesthetic sense – explain Salvatore Crapanzano and Fabiola Minoletti, respectively president and vice-president of the Coordination of Milanese Committees – but also has a psychological effect, fueling citizens' sense of insecurity and distrust. Eliminating them, therefore, becomes an important and significant gesture. Once the work is finished, we will leave the remaining paints to the tenants, so that they can intervene immediately if the vandalistic writings reappear. This type of intervention by the inhabitants has already occurred in many other cases, demonstrating that keeping the facades clean is possible. Together with the volunteers who will respond to the appeal, for the cleaning and painting work on the 28th there will be around sixty volunteers from Rotary and Rotaract Milano Castello who have been collaborating on some cleaning activities for years".