Italy: Region of Calabria Modifies Plans to Build Segregated Housing in Scordovillo After Intervention From Roma Rights Activists
20 March 2025
Brussels, 20 March 2025: A project to evict Romani residents from a segregated camp and rehouse them in new built, segregated social housing units using EU funding has been modified by the Region of Calabria following an intervention from the European Commission at the request of Roma Rights activists. The plans to evict and rehouse the Roma living at Scordovillo camp in the city of Lamezia Terme were highlighted to the Commission by activists from the European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC) and the local Stop Ghettos Committee, in order to prevent EU funding being used to further the segregation of Roma. The Region’s modified plan now provides for the relocation of families from the dilapidated Scordovillo camp into integrated social housing in Lamezia Terme, however activists warn that the plan still has significant weaknesses in implementation that must be addressed.
“Public housing must not be a vehicle for more segregation” said the ERRC’s spokesperson, Jonathan Lee. “Unfortunately, Italian authorities seem to be slow learners when it comes to ethnic segregation. Despite Italy’s many promises to the European Commission that the days of building discriminatory ‘nomad camps’ are over, here we found a plan to build a brand-new ghetto using EU funds. Thankfully, the vigilance of local human rights activists has made sure that this will not happen. It was Italian authorities who were responsible for putting Romani families in these ethnically segregated ‘nomad camps’ in the first place, so now it is Italian authorities who must be responsible for ensuring that they are rehoused in safe and integrated public housing.”
The regional plan for new, segregated public housing for the Romani families of Scordovillo was approved a year ago by the Calabria Region through Regional Council Resolution No. 109 of 25th March 2024, along with subsequent Executive Orders from the relevant regional departments. The project was to be realised through an allocation of European funds amounting to a total of €36 million.
The plan envisioned that the approximately 100 Romani families from the Scordovillo camp, who have been living there since it was constructed by the local authorities in1982, would be temporarily relocated through an intervention carried out by third sector entities with funding of 8 million euros. This intervention also included various projects to promote school and work integration for Romani families. The temporary relocation of the families was meant to allow the Municipality of Lamezia Terme and the Region of Calabria to carry out the environmental remediation of the area and then immediately build a new ghetto with 120 public housing units (funded with 28 million euros), where the temporarily relocated Roma families would be resettled. The new ghetto project was launched on September 26, 2024, through a public notice issued by the Calabria Region to calling for proposals from third sector entities, approved by the Executive Order of the Department of Health and Welfare of Calabria Region No. 13480 of September 26, 2024. Following the call, the contract was eventually awarded to "Comunità Progetto Sud" of Lamezia Terme.
In order to prevent the construction of a new ghetto, the ERRC and the Stop Ghettos Committee wrote to the European Commission in October 2024, informing them that the Calabria Region had decided to use significant European funds to create segregated social housing in Scordovillo.
The European Commission requested explanations from the Calabria Region who, in December 2024, responded to the Commission assuring them that the project had been modified. In reality, the modification was only formally decided later, with Regional Council Resolution No. 29 of January 27, 2025. This resolution rectified the previous year’s decision (Council Resolution No. 109 of March 25, 2024), abandoning the idea of constructing a new public housing ghetto and instead planning for fair housing relocation or "scattered housing" through the recovery of existing public housing assets and/or the purchase of new housing.
Due to the lack of social housing in the Municipality of Lamezia Terme, the regional public housing agency ‘Aterp’ published a public call for the purchase of housing units on February 28, 2025, with a deadline of April 20, 2025. While the ERRC and the Stop Ghettos Committee welcomes the regional project modification that the activists had advocated for it must be noted that the public notice has inherent problems that are likely to lead to its failure, namely:
- The exclusion of real-estate agencies as intermediaries for purchasing the housing units.
- The preference for purchasing isolated housing units rather than those located in apartment buildings.
Previous relocation projects in the region have shown that excluding real-estate agencies from the process of purchasing properties to be used for public housing greatly reduces the chances of success, especially since the local housing market in Lamezia is largely managed by agencies rather than private individuals. Additionally, prioritising isolated housing units over those in apartment buildings does not promote social inclusion and is a direct contradiction to the very concept of ‘scattered housing’ solutions. The activists note that this too has been widely demonstrated by past experiences in other regions.
The ERRC and Stop Ghettos Committee, who have recently requested access to the project documents to better understand the approved modification (and only received a partial reply from the Region’s offices) now calls on the Region to address the weaknesses of the public notice for housing purchases to make fair housing relocation a truly feasible solution.
The Stop Ghettos Committee is made up of human rights activists and organisations: APS Lav Romanò, Fiore Manzo (Cosenza); Gabriella De Luca, Activist (Catanzaro); Stefania Bevilacqua, UCRI Vice President (Cosenza); Cristina Delfino, Activist (Reggio Calabria); and Association ‘Un Mondo di Mondi’ (Reggio Calabria).
This press release is also available in Italian.
For more information, or to arrange an interview contact:
Jonathan Lee
Advocacy & Communications Director
European Roma Rights Centre
jonathan.lee@errc.org
+32 49 288 7679
Rosi Mangiacavallo (in Italian)
Human Rights Monitor for Italy
European Roma Rights Centre
rosi.mangiacavallo@errc.org
+39 328 9420 715
Giacomo Marino
President
Un Mondo di Mondi
unmondodimondirc@gmail.com
+393299036972
