Since January 1, 2025, 24 new municipalities have emerged in France. This is the case in the Doubs department as well as in Éternoz-Vallée-du-Lison in the canton of Ornans.
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20 inhabitants. In Saraz in Doubs, the village has lost inhabitants over the decades. During each municipal election, it is difficult to find volunteers. “Most residents have already been on the city council. Now, this requires a lot of investment, a lot of hours of work to operate. We were really at the end humanly” confides Jean-Philippe Dubois, second deputy mayor of Saraz.
Saraz had a choice. Join Nans-sous-Sainte-Anne or the commune of Éternoz. It is this second scenario which was retained. “Éternoz is a commune which has already experienced connections, which knows the functioning well, which functions very well like us in terms of water, the forest, the school. With the village of Alaise which is already part of the intercommunality, we have a history in common with the cemetery, the schools” continues Jean-Philippe Dubois.
Daniel Cuenod lives in Saraz. At 79 years old, this attachment to a new entity does not bother him. “Our village is very small. There are more who will go away than those who will come!” he said to our journalist Thierry Chauffour. And then with Éternoz, Saraz shares the sector of the magnificent Lison valley. A marriage of convenience.
Éternoz-Vallée-du-Lison: the community of municipalities will increase from 5 to 6 municipalities, to reach 350 inhabitants. Objective “bring something more to our fellow citizens” reassures Christophe Garnier, mayor of the new entity.
There are three of them, resulting from the merger of nine municipalities and bringing the number of municipalities in Doubs to 563.
- Éternoz-Vallée-du-Lisonresulting from the merger of the communes of Éternoz and Saraz. The new town will have 350 inhabitants.
- Rollsresulting from the merger of the municipalities of Mamirolle and Le Gratteris. The new municipality will have 2,012 inhabitants.
- Pays-de-Montbenoîtresulting from the merger of the municipalities of Hauterive-la-Fresse, La Longeville, Montbenoît, Montflovin and Ville-du-pont. The new town will have 1,952 inhabitants.
According to the Senate, the number of municipalities remains particularly high in France, if we compare it to countries of similar or even larger size. Thus, France has three times more municipalities than Germany. For more than thirty years, successive governments have strived to promote the merger of municipalities, with the aim of reducing expenses, by grouping together municipal services and councils while simplifying administrative procedures. These initiatives had rather mixed results, with the number of municipalities continuing to exceed 36,000 until 2015. As of January 1, 2025, this figure fell to 34,875.
