Almost two months after Emmanuel Macron’s first trip to Marseille to present the State’s emergency aid plan to the city, the National Assembly adopted at first reading, Thursday, October 28, an amendment providing for a specific aid of 254 million euros for the renovation of 174 Marseille schools, during the vote on the 2022 draft budget.
“If these credits are entered, it is because we are in the idea of an emergency plan”, said the Minister of Territorial Cohesion, Jacqueline Gourault, during the presentation of this government amendment to the finance bill (PLF). “We are in a state of dilapidation of the schools which means that the State has decided to intervene”, she added, specifying that 174 establishments would have “Helped”. In total, these are “1.2 billion euros of works” which are necessary to rehabilitate all 174 schools, recalled the minister.
The amendment adopted by the deputies specifies that these appropriations “Are supplemented by other funding from public operators”, among others on presentation of files to the National Agency for Urban Renovation (ANRU). The amount of this aid is not yet known. “Of course, the rest of the funding is determined by the city of Marseille”, underlined the minister.
Benoît Payan welcomes “the very strong will of the State”
Prefabricated frozen in winter, water leaks, rats … Many Marseille schools are dilapidated. It is in particular because of this known situation in the number of establishments that the mayor of Marseille, the socialist Benoît Payan, called on the State for help this summer. Mr. Macron had thus gone on September 2 in the Phocaean city to present a large aid plan for the city. Education, police, justice, transport: the total amount of the plan is estimated at 1.5 billion euros, excluding school renovation.
“It is something quite rare and particular that has just happened, it is the translation of the fact that with willpower, with work and relentlessness, we can raise this city”, reacted Mr. Payan to Agence France-Presse, to the vote of state aid by the deputies. “It is also the expression of the very strong will of the State to carry with us the project for this city”, added the city councilor, praising the fact that, “Even if he is not from the same political family, the President of the Republic (…) was held “ to its commitments.
If these provisions are definitively approved by the Parliament within the framework of the 2022 budget by the beginning of December, the municipal council of Marseille must meet before the end of the year to launch the first works as quickly as possible by approving the creation. of the company (association of the State and the city) which will pilot the renovation program. The amendment adopted at first reading by the Assembly provides for an additional 6 million euros for the establishment and operation of this company as well as for carrying out the first forecast studies.