Twenty thousand phone calls since the service was activated at the Santa Maria Maggiore prison six months ago; 5,500 per month and 300 per day, handled in two daily shifts of four hours each. These are the numbers of theUlss 3 Serenissima ‘s Cup booking system, which can now count on 3 more hires than the initial 6, arriving to involve 9 inmates selected from the approximately 270 inmates of the Venetian facility. All of them are Italian, between 25 and 45 years old, many of them university graduates and with computer skills useful to conduct their duties. Workers with regular contracts, paid, who are gradually being framed on a permanent basis. And one of them has been promoted, finding himself conducting his duties outside at the Angel Hospital. The review of these first months was made on Monday, on the day dedicated to St. Basilides, patron saint of the prison police, announcing a novelty: the inauguration of a second room, also inside the prison and blessed by Patriarch Francis, to enhance the service.
“God, the One who gives mana new opportunity. Prisons must be – the words of Msgr. Moraglia, who led a moment of recollection in prayer in the courtyard – a place of recovery. Which means sharing a path, even if it is difficult and even if not all subjects are willing to do so.” “The detention period,” said Ulss 3 General Director Edgardo Contato, “must put the individual in tune with the world, ready to welcome him outside. From 6 to 9 workers and we will see if we need to go further.” Fabio Panizzon, president of the “Hundred Horizons” Consortium, a reality that won the contract, with the “Noigroup” Cooperative in charge of managing just “the lot” of the prison, pointed out that the index of citizens’ satisfaction with the service is high, so much so that no reports have ever come from the Urp. “For the first group of 6 people, hired in the Cooperative,” he clarified, emphasizing the great teamwork that has been done, ” we started with a training activity. From this first experience also came the possibility of operating in the Cup activities outside: the moment arrangements are made with the penitentiary institution, the workers have a way out. Among other things, we are working for different positions for those who have served their sentences.” While the Patriarch alluded to the imminent recovery of the Mons. Vianello House in Campalto, which, once the restoration work is completed, will be able to “accommodate about ten men” who are going through the transition period from prison to free life, the director of the Venetian detention facility, Enrico Farina, recalled how 160 inmates should be handled at Santa Maria Maggiore, but “currently they average 275. Dealing with users? It requires,” Farina noted, “communication skills: the results have been extraordinary. Our educational area has selected those inmates with the right characteristics to be able to perform this type of service.”
Restricted people mainly deal with phone calls related to laboratory tests. “Not everyone is ready to perform such activities. In addition to so-called ‘domestic’ work related to running the institution, we have analyzed the needs of the area, identifying three areas: building maintenance, catering and hotel services, and communication skills, just as in the case of the Cup. Thanks to funding from an association, we are, among other things, trying to start the opening of a bakery. On a daily basis I get calls from entrepreneurs asking me if there are young people here with certain characteristics, to whom we can assign a profession.” Some 90 inmates have been involved in various job opportunities this year. “Prison emptying? It can happen,” Farina continued, “also thanks to these gradual reintegration processes. “When we finish our shift,” the comment of one of the Cup workers, “we have the enthusiasm of having engaged in something useful. “When we work,” echoes a colleague, “we feel like we are out of prison and have a chance for redemption that we cannot miss. And the synergy between Santa Maria Maggiore and Ulss 3 is not the only one that has been put in place in favor of a gradual return to normalcy for inmates: another one, the one presented Wednesday, in Sant’Apollonia, between the Venetian Prison and the Procuratoria di San Marco (read here).
In these scorching hot days, thoughts cannot help but go to the situation in the cells. The chaplain of the Venetian men’s prison, Don Massimo Cadamuro, who was present at Santa Maria Maggiore on Monday, explains that he asked Mof (those in charge of the building’s routine maintenance) to obtain “a mapping of needs, that is, of how many fans are needed. The inmates,” says the priest, who has taken over the baton from the late Fr. Antonio Biancotto, “keep them on practically all day long, with the result that many fail. As soon as we get confirmation, we will place an order: we would need about fifty new fans.” Don Cadamuro reports that the situation is quite heavy especially on the third floor, “with the sun beating down all day. The fans are still present in every cell,” he says, “but we are trying to provide for the replacement of those that no longer work. Then the announcement of an initiative he is working on: in the current Jubilee year, the organization of a pilgrimage on foot, from Terni to Rome, together with some inmates.
C.I.D. s.r.l. Società a Socio Unico – Casa editrice del settimanale Gente Veneta – CF e PI 02341300271 – REA: VE – 211669 – Capitale Sociale 31.000 euro i.v. – Dorsoduro,1 – 30123 Venezia
Iscriviti a GREEN&SALUS e non perderti nessun aggiornamento, ti invieremo 1 volta a settimana i nuovi articoli!
