A shed built for commercial,
industrial or artisanal use cannot be used as a place of
worship, where hundreds of people enter for religious festivals
with a significant impact on the city's urban design.
The Lombardy regional administrative court (TAR) wrote this
in its decision to uphold a measure brought in by the Cantù town
council with which last June the administration ordered the
cultural association Assalam to stop using a building in Via
Milan - that had been at the center of polemics in recent years
- as a place of worship even during the Muslim holy month of
Ramadan.
In rejecting the appeal by the association, the Milan judges
said that "the large number of people entering the building
during religious celebrations" is a use "of the premises that,
due to its urban and building effects, requires authorization
prior to build" a place specifically for the purpose.
The judges said that the association's argument that "not
having been expressly prohibited, use as a place of worship is
implicitly authorized" could not be upheld.
The court added that the town council, "once it had verified
that the change in use without a permit to build, correctly
applied the sanctions foreseen" for works that had "not received
building permits, ordering the removal or demolition".
The judges instead upheld the association's appeal of the
town council's successive measure that threatened to take the
building away to put it up for sale.
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