• Eight months after the passage of the storm Alex, the works are still important in the affected communities.

  • The meeting with the Head of State was "important" to bring up to the highest level "the still very present urgency" to repair the damaged towns.

  • The priority of the work is to re-establish links such as bridges or to take care of families who would like to find their village.

On Monday, the President of the Republic promised, during a meeting with elected officials of the Alpes-Maritimes, to grant increased aid, 572 million euros, to rebuild the devastated valleys and ordered his ministers to lift the administrative blockages delaying work.

An amount that remains below what the mayors of the affected municipalities expected, for "the extent of the work that still remains to be done".

They had asked for 1.09 billion euros.

“Eight months later, everything is urgent, there are only priorities, exclaims Jean-Pierre Vassallo, mayor of Tende.

In particular, the protection of the banks to rebuild the links between the tracks, because we are always trapped.

And we still have 55 families who want to go home, we have to relocate them quickly.

The population is in a fragile state ”.

"We must not count on the State to move forward"

Same observation in Breil-sur-Roya.

Sébastien Olharan, the mayor of the town, declares: “What we will have from the State will be a bonus.

I had already launched requests to rebuild bridges or rehabilitate public establishments such as the town hall destroyed by the storm, for example.

We cannot count on the government to move forward.

Since the disaster, work has continued but there is still everything to do.

We have lost a campsite, a swimming pool, stadiums… We will still need years and we will not be able to find everything.

"

He adds: “In what has been announced, there are the European Union funds, the Barnier funds, the VAT compensation funds.

So it is really 143 million that will be paid under the solidarity endowment, for non-insurable goods of communities.

This is therefore 10% of what had been assessed by the communities concerned.

The elected representative also wonders how will be the distribution of the promised aid between the municipalities.

Relay for the population

In Saint-Martin-Vésubie, the priorities are similar.

“As mayor, our skills are limited,” says Ivan Mottet.

We are the relay from the population to the institutions, so our urgency is to reassure them and move forward little by little.

Currently, we would like insurance to be more responsive.

You have to put yourself in the shoes of someone who has lost their home and who is desperately waiting to know if they can project themselves into the village ”.

Regarding the announcements of the President of the Republic, he considers that "it is never enough" even if "it is already a first step which will allow to continue to help reconstruction".

By the end of June, a new stopover will be made for the final containment of the banks and to secure the houses on the edge, indicates the elected official.

"We are on the right track, things are developing positively," he concludes, hoping to see tourists coming up during the summer.

Nice

Macron extends aid for the valleys of the Alpes-Maritimes and orders the administration to speed up

Planet

A cry for help to "repair" the Mercantour National Park

  • Reconstruction

  • Storm

  • Nice