TORINO. After the summer, at least half of the Turin sports associations risk being left without a venue. The reason? A new chapter will begin in September for educational institutions struggling with the anti-Covid guidelines. The watchword is, as always, distancing. To make it possible, it may also be necessary to use school gyms and district spaces, using them as classrooms. And the sports realities that leaned on these public spaces now risk finding themselves without.
There are 315 realities in Turin alone, involving 30,000 people including athletes and amateurs for 4,000 hours of sports per week. If public spaces were suddenly missing “there would be no plan B”, explains Simone Ricca of Polisportiva Gandhi, a reality that organizes minibasket and hip hop dance activities with 800 members: “Our lessons are at popular prices to be accessible at all. We cannot pay for private space; we should stop forever. ”
The same situation also for competitive realities, such as the Ramon-Fonst fencing club, which before the lockdown had a concession in a district in Strada Mirafiori, and now risks not having a place to train the athletes anymore: «We have athletes who are reached the first places in national competitions – says Paolo Cuccu, the president -. Without certainties, registrations cannot start and at the same time we cannot keep our athletes still for too long. We are in a limbo that could cost us dearly ».
That of Turin’s sports realities is not only a problem of space but also of timing. Currently, enrollments in September are still pending to find out if and when it will be possible to return to use the school and district spaces. To underline the importance of programming are the same districts, frightened by a possible impoverishment of the sports offer in the area: “Removing these spaces means putting at risk not only the activities of many amateurs and agonists, but also many jobs”, stresses the district coordinator Carlotta Salerno. A race against time is starting at Palazzo Civico. The executive guidelines on the use of schools were expected in May and instead they arrived only a few days ago: «We are aware of the fact that the spaces for action have shrunk – explains the councilor for education Antonietta Di Martino – but we will do everything possible to respond to both teaching and sporting needs ». For Marco Chessa, president of the Municipality’s Heritage Committee, “leaving aside the sports sector, one of the hardest hit by the health emergency, would be a serious damage to the territory”. But if the gymnasiums of the schools really host the lessons of the students, according to the numbers of the administration, at least half of the facilities made available by the public sector will be off-limits for sports clubs that will suddenly find themselves running out of space.i. —
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