Estates general of housing at the end of November in Marseille, where there is urgency

"To face the social and ecological challenges of housing in Marseille, the City of Marseille has decided to bring together on November 29 and 30 (...) the State, local authorities, donors, promoters, collectives and associations of citizens", announced the town hall of the union of the left (Printemps marseillais) in a press release.

They should "make it possible to develop solutions to respond to emergencies and make Marseille a fairer and greener city", she added.

In the poorest big city in France, housing problems were dramatically highlighted with the collapse of two dilapidated buildings and the death of eight people, in 2018, then a fire in July 2021 in a squatted city , during which three migrants got out of a window.

The socialist mayor Benoît Payan then launched an SOS, calling for the holding of these States General to renovate a city which has some 40.000 slums and almost as many requests for social housing pending. Not to mention degraded condominiums or squatted buildings, these "vertical slums" denounced by social actors.

The State has paid particular attention to the country's second city with the "Marseille en grand" plan presented by Emmanuel Macron in September 2021. This plans in particular to help with the rehabilitation of schools and to set up pedagogical innovations, or even helping to open up the deprived neighborhoods in the north of the city by means of transport.

On the housing side, more than 600 million euros have been announced over 15 years, to fight against unfit housing across the city, in particular via Anru, the National Agency for Urban Renewal. But the concrete variation of these announcements is generally still awaited.