The Provincial Administration of Cagliari, considering the inadequacy of the currently occupied premises, has decided to relocate the Provincial Library in Vico XIV San Giovanni and the Library Service Center in Via Cadello, to the so-called Villa Clara, located at the top dl Monte Claro Park, carrying out a project of renovation and expansion of the Villa and adjoining buildings. The Provincial Library, established since 1962, is an important regional institution with about 75,000 volumes of publishing heritage. From the documents found in the archives, the Province has had the real estate since 1889, the year in which the compromise of sale was registered, from the Ruiseco brothers to the Province, of the entire property of 45 hectares distinguished in civil house (villa), rustic buildings, vineyard, almond grove, vegetable garden, and pine forest, as described in the cadastral documents. During the session of the provincial council on August 17, 1901, an initial expenditure of 500,000 lire was approved to begin construction of the new asylum and to acquire Villa Clara to the property of the institution: in fact, right here, on the site of Monte Claro where patients had already been detached for a decade, the Province of Cagliari had decided to build the new psychiatric hospital, at the suggestion of Prof. Sanna Salaris, head of the psychiatric department of San Giovanni di Dio. Engineer Stanislao Palomba of the Provincial Technical Office was put in charge of the project, and he chose the “pavilion” solution, which was better suited to handle the various stages of mental illness. In 1907 the first pavilions of the Cagliari asylum began to function, remaining in operation until the closure of the last wards in 1998 due to the so-called Basaglia law. Engineer Palomba did not have the villa demolished, and it was restored and used as accommodation for the director and his family. Instead, the rustic cottages behind the villa, where patients had already been admitted, were adapted as stables, warehouses and lodgings for the agricultural colony, which was implanted for the purpose of allowing work therapy for the valid patients and, at the same time, to provide a means of self-sustenance for the asylum.
