The official appointment of the
commissioner for the 2019 Summer Universiade will come at the
end of the week or possibly on Monday through a government
decree.
However, he will not have any special powers, 50-year-old
engineer Gianluca Basile, from Montemiletto, said.
He was however already at work on Wednesday, after the
government entrusted local agencies with managing the event the
previous day.
"I will immediately check with the various parties involved,"
he said in his office at Mostra d'Oltremare, "to understand who
is ready. It is a difficult challenge. The event will be held in
less than a year but we can do it if everyone - the regional
government, the Naples municipality, the Italian Olympic
Committee (CONI), the International University Sports Federation
(FISU) - is willing to give us a hand."
As soon as the appointment is made official, there is the
intention to call for a coordination unit. Since Tuesday, Basile
has initiated contact with the Campania regional government, who
will play a top-level role, and the regional CONI.
Basile will ask the regional government to flank him with
experts in the healthcare and transportation sectors but no
deputy commissioner will be named.
With CONI he will see whether a convention signed in April by
Commissioner Latella with Coni Servizi, which was to be the
operating branch of the event, is still in force.
The agreement was never broken down into details and should
now be rediscussed.
"I have already asked for a meeting with CONI," Basile said.
"Our desire is to go forward with that framework agreement and
draw up the details, but it is clear that we need to see whether
Coni Serzixi still wants to be part of it."
There is instead no doubt on the housing of the about 10,000
athletes.
"The legend of a single athletes village needs to be
dispelled," Basile said. "Since the very beginning, the housing
plan was imagined on three poles: Salerno, Caserta and Naples,
and not only Naples. Discussion on cruise ships should be had
again, which would be good for the city's image and which is
all-inclusive, since the ships are already equipped with all
necessary services. A contract was won by MSC for a 2,000-place
ship and officially Costa has told us twice that it is
interested in a second bidding process that we are thinking of
holding as soon as possible. There is also the possibility of
setting up cabins at the Mostra d'Oltremare in the external
parking lot but we consider this an unlikely option since the
timeline is short and this would complicate the organization of
services."
There is also the need to increase the number of people
involved in the organizing of the event.
"This," Basile said, "was a problem also for Latella and it
is for me, since I have no special powers. When we asked the
government for a commissioner we were imagining one similar to
the one for the Expo, with the possibility to create a structure
that would hire all the people necessary through procedures
other than that of a public competition but this regulation does
not give this power, since it is a regulation that facilitates
the public works a great deal but not the management of services
and personnel. This is why it is necessary to involve all public
structures such as universities, the regional government and
municipalities, starting from Naples. On September this is the
FISU executive committee meeting in Lausanne. We will work hard
to be ready and get the go-ahead."
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