“The municipality does not take its responsibilities”

Opinions

Since February 2024, Agir pour Dijon has been warning about the worrying situation of the city’s EHPADs, given numerous dysfunctions in the care of residents, managerial problems and a catastrophic financial situation. We have continued to reiterate our alerts, through an oral question during the municipal council of March 25, 2024, or even a column in the Dijon Mag of April 2024. Laurence Gerbet met twice with the management of EPCAPA – in April, then in September 2024 -, without any improvement in the situation but on the contrary a constant deterioration. We requested an emergency audit by the ARS, which was carried out in May and which confirmed the seriousness of the situation. We deeply regret that the municipality waited a year since our press release to finally recognize the extent of the difficulties that the city’s EHPADs are going through and from which the residents suffer, both at the Jardins Voltaire and at the Bégonias, in a letter addressed to the families and staff, dated January 16, 2025. Unfortunately, this letter does not provide any serious answers. The first measure is to add an administrative level to that of the EHPADs themselves and the public establishment for the reception of elderly people of the City of Dijon (EPCAPA), by requesting a national public establishment, EPNAK. However, multiplying the layers of decision-makers will only dilute responsibilities and slow down actions. This decision is all the more surprising as we discovered that the president of EPNAK since 2018 is none other than Madame Tenenbaum, already a member of the board of directors of EPCAPA as a municipal councilor appointed by the mayor of Dijon. On a financial level, the envelope of 800,000 euros released exceptionally at the end of 2024 by the ARS in no way resolves the structural cash flow problem of an establishment whose deficit now amounts to nearly €2 million in 2024. We demand that lasting and radical solutions be taken as soon as possible: – the change of the current management which has shown itself to be incompetent for years; – real estate reinvestment in the city of Dijon to reduce the rent burden that has become excessive.