The next article that Kristiana and I presented was a historical perspective on water resource management in the Vento region. It provided an evolutionary description of the goals of the Reclamation Consortia since the sixteenth century and how those goals have changed, as well as how the Consortia itself functions. One of the biggest struggles in the Consortia was joining public and private interests through both the technical and financial points of view.

The article starts by giving a brief history of the development of the Vento region and highlights the difficulties associated with it. The land was not particularly inviting considering the massive amounts of cultivation and continual maintenance. As we learned through our readings and experiences Venice itself is a city that is constantly deteriorating and particularly sinking. It really made us question that given the difficulty to build and maintain the area, why they even choose the region in the first place?

As far as the Reclamation Consortia part in all this, they are the ones driving this process of reclaiming and cultivating the land. At the time, the Republic of Venice deemed the reclamation of these lands at a benefit to the entire public even though the private landowners received a great benefit. The private members of this Consortium had to pay fees according to the land that they owned as well as the quality of that land. This system had its ups and downs but for the most part they were able to solve them through strict regulation.

Nowadays the Vento region has major problems within the structure of the city essentially falling apart. So as far as the goals of the Consortia, they have shifted towards maintenance of the city from reclamation of the land. Hopefully they will be able to fix this problem as time is of the essence to save this beautiful city.