“I am an ardent defender of our rurality because our department does not have the luxury of being able to pit its rural communities against its central city. Indre needs both. » On March 13, 2024, in a letter addressed to all the mayors of the department, Gil Avérous, mayor of Châteauroux and president of Châteauroux Métropole, wished to put the church back in the middle of the village. The reason ? That of an emerging controversy concerning the allocation of subsidies from the Rural Territories Equipment Grant (DETR), fueled by differences of opinion between elected officials of the department’s capital, senator Frédérique Gerbaud and certain mayors of municipalities surrounding rural areas.
As a reminder, this grant is intended to finance investments in rural communities. In Indre, all are listed as “rural”, except Châteauroux. The envelope reaches 11.54 million euros in 2024 (compared to 11.19 million euros in 2023).
“We’re coming to steal DETR funds again”
However, since 2019, intermunicipalities like Châteauroux Métropole can benefit from it under certain conditions. The problem, “it is that prefectural towns in very rural departments are legally allocated credits on the grounds that they are members of EPCI (public intermunicipal cooperation establishments) themselves made up of small eligible rural communities”, declared Frédérique Gerbaud in February 2024 (NR of February 23), shortly after submitting her bill on the subject.
Contested subsidies
The first episode of tension has its roots in the allocation of subsidies for the reconversion work of the former Banque de France for the transfer of the municipal police. Work, according to the senator and the president of the Association of Rural Mayors of Indre Roland Caillaud, for the sole benefit of Châteauroux and not benefiting the intercommunity (like the community bus depot, for example).
Faced with these criticisms, Xavier Elbaz, mayor of Villedieu-sur-Indre and chief of staff to Gil Avérous, does not hesitate to dismantle the criticisms one by one: “Within this building (the premises of the former Bank of France, place La Fayette, in Châteauroux) which belongs to the Agglomeration, the business incubator whose competence is intermunicipal occupies the largest part. There are municipal archives, but the majority are intercommunal archives. Concerning the municipal police, we are moving towards an intercommunal police force, already with Saint-Maur, then with other municipalities in the future. »
The friction could have stopped there, but on April 8, a meeting of the DETR departmental commission for projects over €100,000 was held and caused further discussion. Was presented to the members of the commission – made up of parliamentarians, mayors, representatives of EPCI, etc. – the project to requalify the former Mellotée printing works in Châteauroux. At a cost of €1.5 million excluding tax, €375,000 of DETR was envisaged. Senator Frédérique Gerbaud, member of this commission who gave a unanimous favorable opinion, denounces this decision: “Don’t let anyone tell me that this project has community interest. We’re coming to steal DETR funds again. »
François Avisseau, deputy mayor of Chantôme and departmental councilor, also denounces him in a press release calling for “the State and its representative (the prefect) to make the distribution of DETR in our department more transparent”. Xavier Elbaz, for his part, maintains that “the economic heart remains the prefecture city and when we reconvert and install new sites, it is not only Châteauroux which benefits”. He also recalls that the Action Cœur de Ville program, from which Châteauroux benefits, does not have a dedicated budget envelope, contrary to what has been criticized, but is prioritized and financed thanks to common law envelopes, such as the Endowment support for local investment (DSIL), ecological transition funds, etc.
