“housing that is not worthy”

While some gendarmerie barracks no longer pay their rent, others should close their doors permanently. In an alarming state of dilapidation, that of Creusot (Saône-et-Loire) seems condemned.

A report published by the Senate in July 2024 raises an alarming observation about the real estate situation of the national gendarmerie. While some barracks no longer pay their rent, others will simply cease to exist.

For twenty years, more than 200 state barracks have been abandoned by the national gendarmerie. But this slow fall is not yet over. The senatorial report highlights three sites in particular which should also disappear, due to lack of restoration: Le Creusot (Saône-et-Loire), Douai (North) and Boulay (Moselle).

The report specifies that these barracks “currently present a significant need for rehabilitation and can only be preserved within the state park of the gendarmerie at the cost of a substantial real estate investment effort to maintain them in good condition”.

David Marti, the mayor (PS) of Le Creusot and president of the Creusot Montceau urban community, has already turned the page. He did not reject this decision to close the gendarmerie in his commune: “The State asked me the question through the Prefect, the Sub-Prefect and the gendarmerie itself : “are you opposed to the gendarmerie closing and the gendarmes going has Montchanin where there will be a brand new gendarmerie?” Of course, I said that I was not opposed to it.”

It must be said that the first councilor has good reasons to be resigned. “At some point, you have to be objective: we have a gendarmerie barracks in Le Creusot which is in very poor condition.t”he describes. “LThe gendarmes workin conditions that are extremely difficult, some live in housing that is not worthy.”

The president of the urban community saw these unworthy conditions with his own eyes. “TEvery year, I went to the greeting period to greet them.”he remembers. “I could see that this couldn’t continue. II was sensitive to the arguments of the Colonel who told me: “we will not ask for closure if you do not agree, but we are working in conditions which are not possibleTHE”.

It’s a building that’s aging poorly, it’s an energy sieve… It’s a whole.

David Martin

mayor of Le Creusot

What David Marti was able to observe were “leaks“in the accommodation where the gendarmes and their families live, a”isolation“non-existent, in short a place where”everything has to be redone“. The State’s first plan was to invest several million euros to rehabilitate the place, but the situation evolved towards a regrouping of the Creusot and Montchanin brigades in a new building located on Montchanin lands.

David Marti sees this grouping favorably. “Le Creusot is in the police zone, pas in the gendarmerie zone, so here we are not so concerned by gendarmerie interventions”he says. “There are one or two small communities around which, for their part,t in the gendarmerie zone. But II considered that the fact that the gendarmes going to Montchanin did not reduce the level of public service in the Creusot basin. That it is 5 kilometers from the current barracks, frankly, that is not what will reduce the level of public service.“

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Even if he had chosen to request the maintenance of the state barracks in Le Creusot, Mayor Creusotin thinks that the territory would have lost out. “Çit would have cost nothing (to the municipality) to maintain, but let gendarmes work In these conditions… I’m sorry, but this is not acceptable. And if there were to be rehabilitation, the gendarmerie of Montchanin was a priority, in 10 years there will be would have Still nothing done.”

David Marti does not have information as to the deadlines for the regrouping between the two barracks and the closure of the Creusot site. When contacted, the gendarmerie was unable to respond to our requests in time.