Matera

For 2025 the municipality of Matera applies a municipal IRPEF surcharge at a single rate of 0.8%; taxable incomes up to 10,000 euros are exempt (resolution no. 90 of 10 December 2024, confirming existing rates). The 2026 waste-tax (TARI) payment notice is on Matera Digitale. Rents, prices and the transport pass are in the data.

Registry services run through ANPR and the Matera Digitale portal (SPID login), where payments are also handled; separate waste collection has a dedicated site, Matera Pulita. The municipality has extended to 10 January 2027 the seasonal assignment of non-food market pitches in the Rioni Sassi.

To enter with a dog, cat or ferret you need a microchip, an EU pet passport or health certificate and a valid rabies vaccination. Mandatory registration in the regional pet register, lead at all times and a muzzle to hand. Pets allowed on trains under Trenitalia rules and in apartment buildings by law.

Rules depend on who is arriving: EU/EEA/Swiss citizens (no visa, registration with the Comune after three months), non-EU citizens for stays up to 90 days (Schengen rule, type C visa where required) and for long stays (national type D visa and a residence permit within eight working days of arrival).

In Matera trains from Bari are run by FAL (Matera Centrale, Matera Sud, Villa Longo); the nearest FS station is Ferrandina-Scalo Matera. City buses are run by ATI Miccolis, with the Linea Sassi every 30 minutes and tickets on the Dropticket app. The municipality has a ZTL section, with the via Piave ZTL under discussion in 2025.

Euro, cards accepted almost everywhere, a legal cash limit. Anyone living in Italy for most of the year is tax resident and taxed on worldwide income under three IRPEF brackets; specific regimes exist for the self-employed (forfettario), inbound workers, foreign pensioners and new residents. Contributions go to INPS; annual return with the 730 or Redditi form.

Health care in Matera is the ASM's remit, with the Madonna delle Grazie hospital in contrada Cattedra Ambulante, where the emergency room is open 24 hours a day. The CUP answers on the toll-free number 800 814 814; the family doctor can be chosen online with a digital signature.

Non-EU pensioners enter with the elective residence visa, EU pensioners through free movement; public healthcare is accessible by compulsory or voluntary registration. Optional 7% regime on foreign income for those moving to small southern municipalities. Cheap houses in villages, services concentrated in cities.

A VAT number (partita IVA) from the Agenzia delle Entrate for freelancers; for businesses the Comunicazione Unica to the Registro delle Imprese, which also notifies the Agenzia, INPS, INAIL and SUAP. Main forms: sole proprietorship, SNC/SAS, SRL and SRLS, SPA. Compulsory PEC, annual chamber fee, e-invoicing. Invitalia incentives; non-EU citizens need a self-employment permit or the investor visa.

The University of Basilicata's DiCEM is based in Matera, at via Lanera 20, with bachelor's degrees in Cultural Heritage Operator and in Landscape, Environment and Urban Green, the single-cycle master's in Architecture and master's degrees in Archaeology and Art History and in Anthropological and Geographical Sciences (SAGE).

Matera's identity is tied to the Sassi: according to UNESCO, on the World Heritage List since 1993, a cave settlement among the best preserved in the Mediterranean, occupied since the Palaeolithic. The municipality speaks of the Rioni Sassi; the tourism portal distinguishes Sasso Barisano, Sasso Caveoso and Civita.

Matera's municipal civil protection plan publishes maps on seismic vulnerability, flood-prone areas, landslides and hydrogeological risk, flood scenarios for the failure of three dams, interface fires, an industrial plant with an external emergency plan and a snow plan. Temperatures and PM10 exceedance days are in the data.

Visitors see the Sassi (Barisano, Caveoso and Civita), inscribed by UNESCO in 1993, rupestrian churches such as Madonna delle Vergini (Santa Maria Masulo) and Mater Domini, the cave house in vico Solitario and the Museo Nazionale d'Arte Medievale e Moderna della Basilicata at Palazzo Lanfranchi. The portal offers a Matera Welcome Card.