New standoff between the police headquarters and the teams of Anne Hidalgo. The latter opposes a future “crackland” in the 12th arrondissement.
Anger, consternation and frank opposition: such are the reactions provoked by the announcement of the police chief to once again move the camp of crack users. Tuesday evening, in a statement, the latter said that a new address had been found for these hundreds of people on the street. Initially located in Place Stalingrad, then in the gardens of Eole, and for four months parked at Porte de la Villette -on the edge of the towns of Pantin and Aubervilliers in Seine-Saint-Denis-, they will therefore leave this northeast of the capital. Head south-east of Paris. An unused parcel belonging to the SNCF and which the latter agrees to lend will host the crack scene.
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This decision raises a wind of anger. The first deputy of Paris, Emmanuel Grégoire, says to himself “appalled” by this choice for which the city was in no way consulted. For the latter, the prefecture, which is only moving the problem, will not be able to keep these drug addicts on this new site. “Because the latter is too far from their historic site, Place Stalingrad. They are going to leave the place., he warns. As a result, these drug addicts, with a difficult and often aggressive life course, will, according to the elected representative, disperse into the streets.
common front
With the announcement of this installation, the anxiety that is taking hold in the 12th arrondissement has also crossed the ring road. The SNCF site is in fact a stone’s throw from Charenton-le-Pont. Like the mayors of Pantin and Aubervilliers in recent months, the city councilor of this town in Val-de-Marne, Hervé Gicquel, is stepping up to the plate. “I will do everything to prevent this project”he warns, wanting to protect its inhabitants. “I don’t want drug addicts to come to my nearest neighborhood, which has 1,400 homes and a shopping center.”
Paris and Charenton are also united against this future “Crackland”. Because if it is well installed as announced, it will be on land planned to accommodate a vast urban development project straddling the two cities. “It will be exactly where a pedestrian axis is also planned linking Paris to Charenton. If so, I’m stopping the project.”warns the elected representative of the suburbs by denouncing the lack of “consideration for its city and its inhabitants”.
Especially the latter wonders about the inconsistency of the State between a prefect of police who jeopardizes an important urban project and the prefect of the region who on the contrary supports it. While Emmanuel Grégoire urgently calls for a meeting with all the actors concerned by crack in Paris, his health assistant, Anne Souyris, asks for accommodation for these drug addicts instead of moving them once again. And it is according to her, to the prefect of Police, Didier Lallement, to find them.
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In his press release, the latter indicates that he acted on the orders of the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin. The latter asked him to look for a place that is not “this time, on the public road or a square”. “The criteria for this research were to select a site that is, on the one hand, as far as possible from residential areas, shops or transport nodes, and, on the other hand, accessible to health and social services”. This wasteland of the SNCF meets, according to him, these criteria. And it was also necessary, according to the press release, to find a solution outside this North-East of Paris and its two arrondissements – the 18th and 19th arrondissements – which, the press release adds, “for too long been tested by the presence of drug users”.
SEE ALSO – Crack in Paris: what is the solution? “When you are next to a shooting room it is not the same thing”, recalls Luc-Antoine Lenoir