Renato Turano

Renato Guerino Turano (born 2 October 1942) is an Italian and American politician and businessman. He served in the Italian Senate from 2006 to 2008, representing Italian citizens in North America and Central America.

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Early life and private career

Turano was born in Castrolibero, Calabria, Italy, and moved to the United States with his family at age fifteen. He attended the University of Illinois at Chicago from 1962 to 1966 and returned in 1990 for a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree.[1]

Turano's family purchased a small Chicago baking company in 1962 and eventually developed it into one of the largest artisan bread producers in North America. Turano worked for the company in his youth, and became president and chief executive officer of the Turano Baking Company in 1982. He served as chair of the American Bakers Associations (ABA) in the 2000s and led a march of eighty bakers to Capitol Hill to lobby for sector relief during a commodity crisis affecting wheat. In 2009, he was described as one of the twenty most influential baking managers in America.[2]

Turano has been active in the Italian-American community for several decades. He founded Chicago's Casa Italia, served on the National Italian American Foundation (NAIF), and from 1996 to 2006 was an American consulate to the Region of Calabria, representing Calabrian Americans at annual conferences in Italy.[3] Turano received a special achievement award from the NIAF for public service in 2007.[4]

Senator

Turano was elected to the Italian Senate in the 2006 general election as a candidate of Romano Prodi's centre-left political coalition, known as The Union.[5] This was the first Italian election in which citizens living overseas were allowed to vote for their own representatives, and Turano was elected to represent voters in North America and Central America. He credited Canadian support for Prodi's coalition as vital to his victory.[6] The Unione won the election, and Turano served for the next two years as a supporter of Prodi's government, helping to consolidate its narrow majority in the Senate.[7] A political moderate, he defended the Prodi administration's centrist course in a 2006 interview, saying that the government was shifting Italy away from its recent "quasi-socialistic" history.[8]

He was defeated in the 2008 general election, when the governing coalition (now running as the Democratic Party) lost to Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom party. Turano actually received more first preference votes than any other candidate in North and Central America, but his party list was narrowly defeated.

Turano has said that he plans to stand for the Italian Senate again in the next general election.[9]

Electoral record

References

  1. ^ "Renato Turano: Bakery chief rises to roles in business, Italian politics" Chicago Tribune, 6 November 2006, accessed 27 July 2011.
  2. ^ Paula Frank, "Baking Management's Influential 20," Baking Management, November 2009, p. 10.
  3. ^ "Chicago-Area Businessman Runs For Italian Senate," Italian Voice, 23 February 2006, p. 5.
  4. ^ "Vic Damone, Dennis Farina, Joe Mantegna Among Award Recipients at Chicago's Gala," Italian Voice, 26 April 2007, p. 1.
  5. ^ Turano first met Prodi during the prime minister's 1998 state visit to Chicago. See Mary Houlihan-Skilton, "Chicago welcomes premier of Italy," Chicago Sun-Times, 9 May 1998, p. 9.
  6. ^ Paul Basile, "Next Stop, Rome!", Italian Voice, 20 April 2006, p. 1.
  7. ^ Phil Stewart, "Italian political dream is "nightmare" for expats," Reuters News, 23 February 2007, 09:17.
  8. ^ Frances d'Emilio, "Overseas Voters May Decide Italy Election," Associated Press Newswires, 21 March 2006, 04:44; "Renato Turano: Bakery chief rises to roles in business, Italian politics," Chicago Tribune, 6 November 2006, accessed 27 July 2011.
  9. ^ Pietro Viola, "Renato Turano: a success Made in Italy", ItalPlanet.it, accessed 27 July 2011.

External links