for the Department of Seine-Maritime “it’s an impasse”

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An untenable equation: this is what the Department of Seine-Maritime is faced with in financial matters. In any case, this is the message relayed by its president Bertrand Bellanger, in the run-up to the next plenary session scheduled for Thursday December 5 and Friday December 6, 2024 in Rouen.

Among the items on the agenda of the session, there is, in fact, the annual debate on departmental policy, devoted this year only to the budgetary subject. “The State, according to what the government has declared so far, wants to cut the operating expenses of the 450 largest local authorities – including all the Departments – to the tune of 2%. For the Departments, this is not tenable. 70% of operating expensessuch as the payment of various RSA-type solidarity allowances, are not controllable. »

Standoff between the Departments and the government

The Departments have thus engaged in a standoff with the State, threatening not to pay the RSA from January 1 if the budget copy is not reviewed. Not to mention the uncertainty about the future of government.

Investment expenses can be staggered or smoothed out over several years. There we are asked to make savings on things over which we have no room for maneuver. When the State decides to revaluate this or that allocation, we can only apply it.

In the meantime, if the government's first announcements are confirmed, the Department must make 42 million euros in savings (out of a total budget, operating and investment, of 2 billion euros). Without currently knowing how to achieve it.

Beyond this budgetary context, Bertrand Bellanger believes that the principles of decentralization are no longer respected. “In recent years, local authorities have gradually lost all fiscal autonomy. However, a community should be able to truly be in control of its budget, by having the leverage of taxes, and being accountable to voters. »

The budgetary orientation debate will be held during the next plenary session in February 2025 and the budget will be voted on in March. But for now, according to the president of the Department, “It’s a dead end.”

In the absence of a solution, the department could itself request to be placed under supervision by state services.

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