The very expensive Vélodrome stadium costs the city of Marseille millions

The Figaro Marseille

“The stadium costs the city more than 10 million euros each year, after taking into account the rent, paid by taxpayers and not by the stadium users.” The findings of the regional audit office are clear. Fifteen years after the signing of a public-private partnership to manage the Vélodrome stadium, owned not by OM but by the city of Marseille, the bill is very high for the town hall and residents. In a report consulted by The Figarowhich will be officially presented this Friday during the next municipal council on the financial structure linked to the Vélodrome stadium since 2013, numerous dysfunctions demonstrate the economic abyss of such an infrastructure for the city of Marseille.

In 2010, the previous mayor, Jean-Claude Gaudin, signed this public-private partnership with Arema, a subsidiary of Bouygues, running until 2045 as part of the stadium’s modernization work, the cost of which was estimated at 457 million euros at the time. Since the end of 2018, OM has taken over the daily management of the stadium, through one of its subsidiaries called “Mars 360”.

However, according to the regional audit office, the city did not take the trouble to renegotiate its bank loans, which partly finance this system, even though the interest rates were more advantageous. “The rates obtained were lower than those anticipated when negotiating the contract, reducing the cost of the loans by around twenty million euros, notes the regional audit office. By not activating the mechanism provided for in the contract, the municipality may have deprived itself of making gains on the cost of financing the contract.” In total, the municipality pays an annual payment of 2.7 million euros for loans taken out to finance the construction phase.

Unjustified refund

Worse still: for years, the city has been reimbursing Arema’s corporate taxes, in other words its profits. Cost of the operation for Marseille city hall: no less than 8.5 million euros. The regional audit office is choking. And for good reason: Arema is almost never profitable, but continued to collect these sums. “Arema, whose results have been mostly in deficit since its creation, has paid a total of only 78,567 euros in corporate tax from 2014 to 2022,” underlines the financial magistrate.

Running the Stade Vélodrome is also expensive. When the partnership was launched, operating costs were expected to cost €10 million per year, three times less than the current cost. “Major events (Rugby World Cup, Olympic Games) further increase this cost since the city must pay for their organisation and compensate the club and the stadium operator for the loss of income during these competitions.”deplores the regional audit office.

Also readMarseille: Does the rent paid by OM for the Vélodrome put the city out of the game?

On the other hand, the rent that OM pays to the city, although revised upwards by Benoît Payan and his teams, remains largely insufficient according to the financial magistrate. The regional audit office has in fact recommended for years that the teams of Franck McCourt, owner of the club, pay rent of eight million euros. During a city council meeting in December 2023, the mayor of Marseille announced that he had complied with the demands of the financial magistrate. A false statement according to the report, confirming the fears of environmentalists and the opposition. “The annual rent requested was not eight million euros as the city had committed to, but five to six million euros, representing an additional cost of two to three million euros per year for the municipality.”deplores the regional audit office.

“We consider the report of the regional audit office as a plus and not as a minus, because there were things that we did not know, recognizes the deputy mayor in charge of finances, Joël Canicave. We will drag this contract like a ball and chain until 2045. But we will follow the recommendations of the report in order not to make it less harmful but to do better.” In the corridors of the town hall, the entourage of Mayor Benoît Payan assures that discussions have been launched with Franck McCourt’s teams to be able to recover the sums owed to the town hall.