Gabrielli’s appeal to mayors: “Stop appointing councillors for security”

“I believe that those responsible for governing local authorities should focus primarily on looking after their local areas; for this reason, I would urge mayors to stop appointing councillors for security, as this leads people to imagine that mayors are ultimately responsible for security, which only creates confusion.” The appeal to mayors from former Chief of Police Franco Gabrielli came during a two-day conference in Rome organised by ALI (Italian Local Authorities), chaired by the Mayor of Rome, Roberto Gualtieri.

During a panel discussion on ‘democratic security’, Gabrielle addressed the mayors directly: ‘Rather,’ said Gabrielli, ‘call them departments for City Care or City Maintenance. This is no joke, but especially today, when there is a strong demand for security from citizens due to an exaggerated perception of the problem, if we want to put the church back at the centre of the village, we must remember that responsibility for security lies primarily with the state, in the dual sense of those responsible for the issue itself, but also those responsible for the administration of justice and the enforcement of sentences.”

Gabrielli then recalls how: “The 2017 law established that the point where the responsibilities of the state and local authorities intersect is that of urban security, but even in that case,” he says, “I believe that it is the responsibility of local councils to ensure the usability of public spaces, to maintain them and to combat urban decay, not security in the strict sense.” According to the former Chief of Police, further confusion is caused by the ‘half-hearted reform’ of the local police currently being worked on by the Meloni government: “Quite apart from the fact that we have never seen a matter of concurrent jurisdiction regulated by a legislative decree, the serious issues concerning the local police have not been addressed in any case. ‘And do you know why?’ Gabrielli asks rhetorically. ‘Because to do so properly, one would have to seriously address how state forces are organised and what their responsibilities are; but since that is a hot-button issue, it is not being tackled.’