Scalea's municipal executive has approved the Open S.C.A.L.E.A. project and participation in the Italian Culture Ministry's first Cultura nei piccoli comuni call. The proposal combines a Memory Archive, a community forum, workshops for young people and associations, and digital work on local heritage. The public notice board confirms municipal executive resolution 135 of 28 August 2026, publication 1211.

The project budget is €90,000. The municipality is seeking €72,000 from the ministry's Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity and envisages providing €18,000 itself, a 20% contribution. That sum has not yet been committed: the town would allocate it only if the application succeeds, through a later decision and a required amendment to the 2026 budget.

The five proposed phases cover organization, a community forum, Open Lab workshops, narrative maps and multimedia, and a public presentation of the results. The archive is intended to collect residents' testimony, photographs, documents, traditions and knowledge. The University of Calabria is named as a technical partner, alongside heritage authorities, local associations and business organizations.

The resolution approves an application; it is not notice of an awarded grant or a launched programme. The decisive steps are the ministry's selection, a subsequent budget amendment and only then a detailed timetable for collecting materials and running workshops. Until those occur, the project should be understood as a prepared proposal with conditional funding.