EUROPEAN SKI AREAS: WEB RESOURCES LISTED BY EUROPEAN COUNTRIES
ITALY (credits: Umberto Izzo)
National public and private institutions that play a role in fostering the goal of safety of the ski areas:
Authorities: Overview
As regards the public and private subjects in charge of supervising the behaviors of skiers within a ski area, art. 21 of the Law 363/2003 provides:
Art. 21. (Subjects responsible for sanctions)
1. Subject to the regional laws already in force in the regions, the State Police, the State Forestry Corps, the Carabinieri and the Guardia di Finanza Corps, as well as the local police, in carrying out the service supervision and rescue in ski resorts, shall monitor compliance with the provisions of this Act and impose the corresponding sanctions against those who infringe them.
2. Complaints relating to the violation of the provisions of Article 9, paragraph 1, are issued, normally, upon reports made by ski instructors.
According to this provision, which states that the supervision over the ski behaviors of ski areas and the power of issuing sanctions is a matter of public officers, no legal responsabilities have been found on a SAO who failed to block and to issue sanctions against a skier who was dangerously skiing and ended up colliding with a skier who resulted severily injured.
Additionally, at the regional level, only a 2002 regional law of Friuli Venezia Giulia provides for the professional role “pattugliatore” or “patroller”, who is defined by the law as “the individual who, acting under the supervision of SAOs, is in charge of carry on activities in the field of prevention and safety, by patrolling ski areas, taking care of SA signals, marking the borders according to the characteristics of the slopes and the snow conditions, controlling the conditions of the slopes, giving assistance in case of accidents, and taking care of any activities that could convey information to skiers concerning the behaviors on the slopes and the danger of the mountains”.
Public/private institutions
Article 5 of the Law 363/2003 envisaged financial support for setting up policies for accident prevention, but after the first financial expenditure this provision was not financed again every year:
Art. 5
(Information and dissemination of precautions aimed at the prevention of accidents)
1. For the financing of campaigns, on an annual basis, to promote safety in the exercise of winter sports, is allocated the sum of € 500,000 per annum, with effect from the 2003. Information campaigns are defined and prepared, after hearing the Permanent Conference for the relations between the state, the regions and the autonomous provinces of Trento and Bolzano and the national sports federation responsible for winter sports recognized by the Italian National Olympic Committee (CONI), the Minister for Regional Affairs, in agreement with the Minister of Health. The campaigns provide the more extensive information to those who practice winter sports, also providing the dissemination of knowledge of the classifications of the slopes, of the signs and the rules of conduct laid down by this law.
2. Within the limit of 20 percent of the resources allocated by subsection 1, the Minister for Education, University and Research agrees with the national sports federation responsible for winter sports recognized by the Olympic Committee to set up initiatives aimed at disseminating the knowledge of classifications of the slopes, the signs and the rules of conduct referred to in paragraph 1, also by entering into appropriate agreements and providing information campaigns to be carried out in schools, to be carried out during normal school hours.
The public institutions in charge of controlling the safety of SAs are mainly the regions or the autonomous provinces, while the central government play no role in this respect. Private institutions in charge of the safety of SAs are the private operators who run the SAs.
At the statistical level, an important role for collecting and processing the information concerning the number e types of accident occurring every year in the Italian SAs is played by the Centro di addestramento alpino della Polizia di Stato di Moena, although this institution does not publish official reports every year (no web site of this institution appears to be available).
From 2003 to 2007 the SIMON system was administered to this extent by the Istituto Superiore di Sanità of Rome, but the last official report was issued in 2007 and since then no official data on ski accidents are reported at the national level in Italy.
National public or private entities representing the Ski Area Operators
At the national and regional level ANEF (Associazione Nazionale degli Esercenti Funiviari – corresponding to the National Association of Ski Area Operators) is the private organization representing the industry, which gathers all the single private enterprise that run the business of ski areas in Italy. The ANEF of the Lombardia region worked, together with the regional government, to a model contract (whose text is also available in English) to provide to consumer skiers the services that these latter need to use safely a ski area (called: “Standard agreement for the use of skiable areas in the Lombardy Region”). Another website of an ANEF local association is that of the Autonomous Province of Bozen.
Other websites of academic or professional origin that provide useful information to our subject of research
www.dirittodeglisportdelturismo.it
http://www.fondazionemontagnasicura.org/en/
http://www.fondazionecourmayeur.it/homepage.asp?l=1
http://www.sicurezzainmontagna.net/
http://accademiamontagna.tn.it/
