“It’s not the poor who need to be fired. It’s not the towers that need to be shaved. What needs to be addressed is poor housing. » The motto resounded several times, on Sunday, November 3, on rue d’Aubagne (1Ahem district), in Marseille. Four days before the opening of the trial to determine the responsibilities that caused the collapse of two buildings that, on November 5, 2018, left eight dead, several hundred protesters came to demand “justice and truth” for the victims. But also to remind us to what extent the issue of substandard housing remains central in France’s second city, six years after the tragedy.
“It’s a continuous flow. “Buildings deteriorate, others are renovated… But, more or less, we continue with the figures from the Nicol report,” says Emmanuel Patris, co-president of A city center for all, a historical association that fights against precarious housing in Marseille. In 2015, the study carried out by Inspector General Christian Nicol at the request of the Ministry of Housing put the number of Marseillais living in poor conditions at 100,000. “present a risk to health or safety”. “There are more than 40,000 potentially unworthy homes”the report said. Homes located in the center of the city, but also in large degraded condominiums, more on the outskirts.
At that time, the mayor of Les Républicains, Jean-Claude Gaudin, ignored the alarm. A blindness that continues to be one of the aggravating factors of the rue d’Aubagne disaster, and then of the shock wave that followed: the endangerment of more than a thousand buildings and the brutal and traumatic eviction of 3,000 inhabitants.
“Great municipal cause”
Today, although the traces of the crisis (walled facades, blocked streets, padlocks that close the entrances, etc.) are less visible, there remain, according to municipal figures, around 1,300 buildings subject to total or partial security. There are 1,200 of them who are still staying in hotels or temporary locations. Every month, municipal services process around 200 complaints about deteriorated, unhealthy or dangerous housing and open around forty procedures. In 2023, the administration issued 518 endangerment orders.
In a column published on Monday, November 4 on his social networks, the mayor (various from the left) Benoît Payan remembers having fought against precarious housing “a great municipal cause”. If the metropolis of Aix-Marseille-Provence, chaired by Martine Vassal (right), is a leader in housing, the municipality has created a housing department, for which around 150 officers specialized in building security currently work. In 2018, there were less than ten.
You have 48.8% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
