Italy: Rome may want private sponsor for Trevi Fountain

Rome, 12 June (AKI) - Rome's mayor is considering finding a private sponsor to fund maintenance of the city's 18th century Trevi Fountain - one of the Eternal City's most iconic artistic landmarks.

Gianni Alemanno made the comments after several small pieces from its facade broke off over the weekend. The damage was blamed on water infiltration from unusual snowfall in February and heavy spring rains.

Alemanno said sponsorship could use the Roman Colosseum as a template. Italian luxury shoe billionaire Diego Della Valle in January agreed to pay for 25 million euros of restoration work for the 2,000-year-old amphitheatre. But around six months after Della Valle agreed to the project project, it has been dogged by controversy and delays and its still not clear when work will begin.

"The Trevi Fountain needs work and maybe, like the Colosseum, there could be a sponsorship to fix it up," Alemanno said on Monday.

"We hope that work will begin on the Colosseum this summer," he said.

Italy and its cities are strapped for cash as a weak economy and efforts to reduce more than 1.95 trillion euros in debt have sapped valuable funds for the country's artistic and archeological sites.

The European Union in March stepped in with almost 42 million euros in funds to help Italy with a 105 million-euro project to fix up Pompeii, the Roman city near Naples that was buried under volcanic ash in 79 AD.

"We have to find some way to create a special fund to protect Rome's most important monuments," Alemanno said.