Authorisation to discard archive documents

The Code of Cultural Heritage (Legislative Decree 42 of 22 January 2004) includes the discarding of archival documents among the activities subject to protection that require prior authorisation (Art. 21(1)(d)).
Art. 21(1)(d) of Legislative Decree 42/2004 provides that the discarding of documents in public archives must be authorised in advance by the competent Superintendency. The competent Superintendence must also authorise the discarding of documents belonging to private archives for which a declaration of particularly important historical interest has been made pursuant to Article 13 of the same Legislative Decree.
Pursuant to Articles 1 and 2 of Presidential Decree 690/1973 as amended (in particular Legislative Decree 506/1998), the Autonomous Province of Trento exercises the powers of the central and peripheral bodies of the State in matters of organisation, protection, supervision, preservation, custody and maintenance of the historical, artistic and popular heritage. These competences also cover the archives and documents of the Province, its functional bodies, municipalities and other local authorities, other public bodies for matters falling within the competence of the Province, as well as the archives and documents of private individuals declared to be of considerable historical interest.

For the Autonomous Province of Trento, the competent structure to issue this authorisation is the UMST Superintendence for Cultural Assets and Activities and, in particular, the Office for Archival and Book Assets and Provincial Archives.

Failure to comply with the obligation to obtain authorisation to discard archival documents, prior to their deletion, entails the sanctions provided for in Articles 169 and 180 of Legislative Decree 42/2004.

• territorial public bodies (municipalities, valley communities);
• functional bodies of the Province;
• provincial health services agency;
• educational institutions;
• other public bodies for matters falling within the competence of the Province;
• private entities, natural or legal persons, owners of archives and documents for which a declaration of particularly important historical interest has been made pursuant to Article 13 of Legislative Decree 42/2004 or Provincial Law 11/1992.

To apply for authorisation, you must fill in the dedicated form and the proposal for rejection. The application must indicate: the personal data of the applicant and the represented entity (in the case of legal representatives of public entities) and their contact details. A declaration must also be made that the administrative use of the documents proposed for discard has ceased and that there are no disputes or investigations by judicial and/or administrative authorities requiring their use.
require their use.
The completed form containing the application, with the attachments specified below, must be sent to the UMST Soprintendenza per i beni e le attività culturali at the pec address
umst.soprintendenza@pec.provincia.tn.it.

The rejection proposal form is made available in fillable PDF format, but also in open format for ease of completion. The proposal for rejection must be sent to the PEC box of the UMST Soprintendenza, as an attachment to the application, in PDF format; to this format it is requested to add the same proposal for rejection in open format, for the insertion of the prescriptions, regarding the individual items, of the Office for Archival and Book Assets and Provincial Archives. The proposal for discarding in open format cannot in any case replace the proposal in PDF format, which is valid for legal purposes.
All templates made available in fillable PDF format must be made unalterable by conversion into PDF/A format before the application is sent.

The following documents must be submitted for authorisation to discard archive documents:

• request for authorisation to discard
• proposal for discarding
• notice pursuant to Art. 13 of EU Regulation no. 679/2016;
• photocopy of an identity document of the applicant (necessary in the case of private individuals, if the application is signed with a handwritten signature and not in the presence of the employee in charge.

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