A few days before the next board of directors (CA) of the Haute-Loire Public Planning and Construction Office (Opac 43), scheduled for Friday December 20, the tenant representatives, gathered within the association Consumption worker force (Afoc 43), wish to express their dissatisfaction.
At issue: the next increase, scheduled for 2025, in housing rents in Opac 43. The social landlord will increase them by 3.26%. “This is the third consecutive year that an increase has occurred, after an increase of 3.5% in 2023 and again in 2024. This is the first time I have seen this in 18 years,” regrets Jean-Luc Issartel, one of three members of Afoc 43 to sit on the board of directors of Opac 43 and representing tenants for many years. “A petition was launched to request a freeze on rents,” recalls Pascal Samouth, president of Afoc 43. Opac 43 has around 5,300 tenants. And according to Jean-Luc Issartel, “65% of HLM tenants in Haute-Loire are below the poverty line. This is a reality that we regularly denounce in CA. We are in a critical social situation,” he insists. For him, the observation is clear: “We have more and more requests for financial aid from the housing solidarity fund – FSL – to help them pay. »
Concerning this new increase in rents, to the maximum possible, the president of Opac 43 Blandine Proriol explains.
Energy renovation is expensive
“A rate has been voted for next year. We chose this increase, in the ceiling, because we must assume our policy of housing renovation and energy renovation in particular. We are investing 13 million euros, including 11 million in existing housing and more than 2 million in new construction. We also have to assume expenses such as the salaries of our employees. All this must be financed and our only resource: these are the rents,” explains Blandine Proriol.
Another point requested by the Afoc 43 administrator: “Better listening. In the board of directors, they don't listen to us. They had the means to increase by 1.6%. We hit the most precarious”, regrets Jean-Luc Issartel, who specifies that he has a problem “with a particular administrator”. “We try to involve tenants as much as possible. Mr. Issartel can speak and make statements to the board of directors,” recalls Blandine Proriol.
Lionel Ciochetto
Mold in their apartment in Puy-en-Velay
“Our big concern: these are the conditions in which people are housed,” indicates Pascal Samouth.
Alongside him, a couple of tenants from the “le 64” building in Val-Vert in Puy-en-Velay came to testify. “It started with elevator problems in 2021. Some elderly residents could no longer use it. Another went to a nursing home,” laments the couple. But it is above all the state of their apartment that they denounce. In several rooms, mold appeared. “In our son's room, it's horrible! A company intervened, but after work, the mold returned…” Now, they are asking for “intermediate” work or rehousing in a “decent” apartment. Anticipating criticism, they point out that they are “not welfare recipients, just workers with low wages”.
Concerning the state of this building and certain apartments, the president of Opac explains “that buildings 64 and 36 are the next two buildings to undergo major renovation work. It is planned for 2025 and that is what we are going to do,” recalls Blandine Proriol.
