Activists from the Utopia 56 association, which helps migrants, supported by unions and the Right to Housing (DAL), have taken to the “beautiful neighborhoods”.
This Sunday noon, nearly 200 people, including Afghan refugees and the homeless, occupied a nursery school located at 34, rue Erlanger (XVI), in the Michel-Ange Molitor district, 200 m from the Bois de Boulogne.
Utopia 56 wanted "the highlighting of 150 people exiled in the street".
And shelter from the cold and the pandemic.
By 6 p.m. their showdown was successful.
The prefecture was mobilized and Ian Brossat, the deputy (PCF) to the mayor of Paris, in charge of Housing was on site.
“We will open a gymnasium in the 5th, details the elected, and if necessary in the 16th to accommodate the homeless”.
55 social housing units initially planned on this site
The school was not chosen at random ... The site which belongs to the city's social landlord, Paris Habitat, is currently empty.
The school should be demolished.
And replaced by 55 social housing and 25 accommodation places for the homeless.
Except that the site is blocked for legal reasons.
Local residents, who take a dim view of social housing and homeless people below their homes, oppose the project.
At the beginning of the month, the administrative court, seized by associations of opponents, pronounced the cancellation of the building permit filed by Paris Habitat.
“The city is being re-examined,” specifies Ian Brossat and Paris Habitat will launch a new project ”.
And will file a new building permit.
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This situation is considered "scandalous" by Jean-Baptiste Eyraud, the spokesperson for the DAL.
"There must be social housing in Paris, which is becoming boboish."
The collective has also filed 420 requisition requests for seven empty buildings in Paris.
And "above all, insists Jean-Baptiste Eyraud, we must protect the homeless".
This Sunday evening, buses were chartered to pick them up and direct them to the gymnasium.