What is the French Federation of Things That Work?

In the 1990s, at the mention of the FFF, the answers could hesitate between the old-fashioned French Football Federation and the noisy and bouncy Marco Prince or Yarol Poupaud of the French federation of funk. In 2022, when you hear FFTM 2022, the answer is direct on a search engine Fédération française de la tannery mégisserie. From November 22, the acronym will now also mean French federation of things that work. But what is this federation that highlights positive initiatives spotted everywhere in France?

Who is behind the FFTM?

At the initiative of the federation, Raphaël Ruegger, 22, ESSEC student and city councilor of Neuvy-sur-Barangeon, a town of 1,200 inhabitants, in the Cher department. “Internship at Evidence [cabinet de conseil en stratégie et communication], I spoke with the founders about my ambition to take a tour of towns in France to write a travel diary. The project is selected and supported to list the things that work in cities and towns.

Leaving in his Clio 4 in February, Raphaël Ruegger will swallow “20,000 km”. “I noticed the increase in the price of gasoline during my road trip (smile), punctured twice and encountered 200 elected officials. “Discussing with them in their town hall or at home – “I only paid for one hotel, I met with remarkable hospitality and I slept with a deputy, mayors, elected officials, associations” – , the student identifies “300 to 350 initiatives” and will “retain about twenty” to launch the French Federation of things that work.

What are the tricks that work?

“I highlight local initiatives that are little known or unknown, which have proven themselves and can be duplicated. They have to work elsewhere,” explains Raphaël Ruegger. This Tuesday, six mayors coming “from a town of 600 inhabitants to an agglomeration of 220,000 inhabitants”, from a village in Haute-Marne or a town in Seine-Saint-Denis will present “alone and without a note for 8 10 minutes” on the stage of the Madeleine theater in Paris, in front of 600 people, their initiative.

“Among the topics covered, mobility, culture, housing, etc. », Says Raphaël Ruegger. Either a dry fountain that creates social ties at the foot of HLM towers, low-rent flatshares for apprentices or on-demand transport rather than buses. The elected officials will then be questioned by Maïtena Biraben. “There is no mayor’s trophy, it’s not the Community Grand Prix,” continues the ESSEC student. We are going to put the mayors back on the front of the stage, many have told me: “It is the most beautiful of mandates but the most ungrateful”. “The only thing that the city councilors have to gain: the media coverage of their initiative and the interest that other elected officials will be able to bring to their project.

Already a season 2 of the FFTM?

“We have to see if this first evening works, if elected officials call elected officials who have things that work to set it up at home,” says Raphaël Ruegger. If nothing has yet been implemented for a new event in 2023 during the mayors’ lounge, elected officials have already positioned themselves “to make local events of the French Federation things that work” or even “to be the pilot town hall of an FFTM territory and to set up several of them”, others are ready “to engage with the FFTM to identify initiatives in their region”. And if ever, it had to stop there, Raphaël Ruegger will have been reinforced by all these meetings in his desire “to become mayor one day”.

source site