Dtoo bad that not all tension produces energy. Because Bordeaux elected officials would certainly have contributed to reducing the city’s energy bill, during the last municipal council of the year. The same causes producing the same effects, the atmosphere was, to say the least, electric during this session of December 17, where the City’s budgetary orientations for 2025 were again discussed, six weeks after an initial examination.
While the opposition groups Bordeaux ensemble and Renouveau Bordeaux asked the mayor to postpone the vote on the initial budget (scheduled for January 28) and, consequently, requested a postponement of the presentation of the modifications made to the budgetary orientations, Pierre Hurmic s is refused to “give in to immobility”. It doesn’t matter that the national context remains uncertain, just as much as the consequences of the finance law on the budgets of local authorities. “We must not be dependent on the chaos of the State,” says the mayor. “Because in matters of public finances as in matters of ecology, deciding later is often deciding too late,” he argued. Especially since after redoing the accounts, the effort requested from Bordeaux, “although important”, would no longer be 16.5 million euros, as the banners posted until last week announced on the facades of the Town Hall, but 13.6 million euros. Enough to “continue to act”, the councilor wants to believe.
Take out a loan
But to continue the policy of investment in equipment to the tune of 105 million per year until the end of the mandate, and “to cope with the demographic development of the city”, while “ruling out any further increase in property taxes”, Claudine Bichet, finance assistant, warns and assumes: “The municipality will have to resort more to borrowing. »
“Without drastic savings measures, the City will find itself in cessation of payments,” objects opponent Béatrice Sabouret who highlights “a 72% increase in the outstanding debt since the start of the mandate”. For operations of the multi-year investment plan which the elected representative of Bordeaux ensemble deplores that they are not detailed.
A “total opacity”, “smoothing with averages”, with “new revenues and expenses” (compared to the document presented in November) against which Nicolas Florian, president of Bordeaux ensemble, does not fail to be indignant. An “amateurism” that is all the more objectionable for the former mayor as the budgetary orientation report “does not take into account the reality of the facts” and is in fact “obsolete”. The sequence irritates Claudine Bichet who denies putting “the city bankrupt”. The fact remains that for Guillaume Chaban-Delmas (Bordeaux ensemble): “You are not in control of things. »
Three hours of debate
While the speeches alternate in an agreed posture between accusations from the opposition and defense by the elected representatives of the majority, Thomas Cazenave (Renouveau Bordeaux) judges the moment in turn “ubiuesque” and “Kafkaesque”. All the more so, provokes the former Minister of Public Accounts, that the current national situation results from “your decision to vote for censure and to throw the country into serious uncertainty”.
Guaranteed reactive effect: this shift from local debate to national politics exacerbates partisan tensions. Where each camp then lends itself to the game of “it’s not me, it’s the other”, the municipal majority transferring responsibility for the situation to the presidential choice of dissolution. Enough to make Pierre Hurmic come off his hinges, annoyed to note that “it is only here that we have such polarized right-wing elected officials”.
A suspension of the session will be welcome to reduce tension and continue the debates. Far from the serenity and constructiveness that the mayor called for in the preamble, he who wanted to demonstrate his desire to “move forward”. Not sure that at the end of these three hours of unpleasant exchanges, the assembly succeeded.
Unanimous support for Mayotte
The day after Cyclone Chido hit the overseas department, an amendment was proposed as a preamble to the aid allocated to associations. Expressing “our support for all Mahorais”, Pierre Hurmic hoped that exceptional aid of 10,000 euros would be granted to the Mayotte emergency fund of Secours populaire français. The deliberation was adopted unanimously. Not without the oppositions on the left – Philippe Poutou – and on the right – Géraldine Amouroux – repositioning the subject at the heart of national politics. The first points out the State’s failings in this department, while the second recalls that it “has done a lot since 2011”.
