REPORTING – For 15 days, 90 caravans illegally occupied private agricultural land in Pont-Saint-Martin. A precarious occupation agreement has been signed to avoid incidents between residents and occupants.
Le Figaro Nantes
Calm reigns this Thursday morning in the midst of dozens of caravans installed along a secondary road crossing Pont-Saint-Martin, south of Nantes. The warm welcome given to our arrival could almost make us forget the illegality of the situation. Sunday, August 13, about 90 families from the trip landed without authorization on this private agricultural land of five hectares, also next to suburban houses. “If we had asked, they would have said no. We have to take initiatives“defends the wife of the dean of the camp. “We leave the weekend of August 27», completes her husband who, dressed in a checkered shirt, calls himself Papou.
“In no case do we‘have authorized this installation, immediately indicates the unlabeled mayor Yannick Fétiveau, reached by telephone. They impact private agricultural land. Our farmers don’t have to go through that. There is a financial loss.Especially since these lands, maintained by two operators, aim to encourage the development of peri-urban agriculture and local hay production. Three years ago, the city had supported, in connection with European subsidies, a clearing operation on it. A few weeks ago, once the land had been cleared, plowed and the seeds planted, the grasses were cut in order to dry out and become hay for the animals. Normally, the seedlings should have sprouted immediately. There, it will be necessary to start all over again according to the words of a connoisseur.
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Who will pay the bill?
On August 13, at 1 p.m., when the first fifteen vehicles arrived, it was too late to intervene. The rest of the camp arrived soon after. Faced with a fait accompli, the city councilor now wishes to act with agility to avoid any incident between the travel community and local residents. A precarious occupancy agreement setting the rules has been put in place with the town hall. The occupants of the land must in particular pay a flat rate per day or per week, paid to the farmers. They also have a duty to pay an invoice for the provision of a five-ton dumpster. However, “the bill (about 1500€, editor’s note) will not be fully honored“, already knows the mayor, warned by the interested parties. A deficit that will be borne by the community of municipalities in charge of waste. As for the water, they are connected to fire hydrants without a meter at the end. “The fellow citizen does not understand“, underlines Yannick Fétiveau, who receives testimonies from inhabitants pointing out an injustice: “They have all the rights“. While a citizen of the city will be taken very quickly if he begins for example an extension of his house without renovation. The first magistrate of the commune also wonders: “who is responsible in case of death? The mayor, when he didn’t authorize anything. On electricity consumption, who takes responsibility for illegal connections?»
Beneath their caravan, a few meters from a BMW and a pretty Porsche, Papou and his wife want to break the clichés circulating about travellers. They assure that they all pay something to the town hall. If they are there, those who were in Bouguenais a few days earlier explain that they stayed in the area to surround one of their own, “a 23-year-old young man, father of a one-year-old child, who is starting his chemo at the Nantes University Hospital“. Le Figaro could not meet him. They also assure that they will leave the grounds clean, and that people are designated to regularly clean the area. “People have hatred when we do nothing. We don’t want to bother people“, they repeat several times. “We’re not all altar boys but it’s like everywhere“says Madame, with a high verbal flow. “In this commune, I am sure that there are delinquents. There are evildoers everywhere“, insists her husband.
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We have illegal installations. Are we short of land?
Yannick Fétiveau, Mayor of Pont-Saint-Martin
In the surroundings, a few residents, few in number in mid-August, confide. “They have nothing to do there. They mess upthunders a former local farmer from his van. “They just have to stay home. We are not going to them. They have houses all over France!” Having returned home the day before, a neighbor affirms, from his garden, to have suffered “no nuisance, no noise“. In six years, this is the first time he has seen a camp here. The mayor, he received complaints, including one about an individual tending to go to the business in a meadow near a property.
This is not the first time that the town has received travellers. The places differ. Similarly, the entire Nantes periphery is confronted with it. “We have illegal installations. Are we short of land?asks Yannick Fétiveau, who is also a departmental adviser. “There is a problem that they themselves suffer. Either we do not allow gatherings, or we organize things.
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No legal action
“We wouldn’t have this problem if the prefecture helped us with the rallies. We would need four to five places of five hectares“, claims the grandfather Papou, specifying that the area located at the foot of the bridge of Cheviré, in Nantes, is too unhealthy. “It is up to the department and the prefecture to meet and see how to move forward on the file“, suggests the mayor of Pont-Saint-Martin, in connection with the communities of municipalities. In accordance with the law, a “departmental scheme for the reception and housing of travellers” guides the authorities. Every six years, it is revised by the prefect and the president of the departmental council. Its main objective is to improvewelcoming itinerant travelers and supporting local authorities in the management of equipment“. It also defines “locations likely to be occupied temporarily for traditional or occasional gatherings“. Between 2018 and 2024, the number of reception areas should increase from 723 to 919.
Sometimes, some communities have recourse to justice but in this specific case, it would have been complicated. The owners should have taken care of it because it is a private domain. But they are not used to it. They should have called on bailiffs to find out, then send a summary. Before waiting for the return of the court. A succession of events which would certainly have lasted longer than the fifteen days of occupation announced by the travelers on their arrival.