Europe 1 with AFP 12:27 p.m., March 9, 2024
Opened in the old town hall of the 4th arrondissement of Paris in September 2021, the Climate Academy arouses as much enthusiasm as criticism.
Detractors denounce a politically oriented vision of the fight for the environment.
Conversely, its users explain that its ambition is to raise awareness of the issues of global warming.
Since its opening in the heart of Paris, the Climate Academy has aroused as much enthusiasm among its users as criticism among its detractors, who denounce a politically oriented vision of the fight for the environment.
However, when this third place opens its doors in September 2021 in the old town hall of the 4th arrondissement at the initiative of the City, its ambition is to raise awareness, through activities and conferences, "all audiences" to the challenges of global warming, its director Sarah Alby explains to AFP.
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In just over two years, it has welcomed 530,000 visitors and organized more than 7,000 events.
“I did not expect such success,” says Patrick Bloche, PS deputy in charge of education at Paris town hall.
That evening, in the old administrative building with blond walls, four young psychologists and authors tackle, for example, the question of emotions linked to eco-anxiety.
Tanguy Descamps, the organizer of the round table, who is participating in the third event of this kind, is delighted "to have a place like this" to meet actors from all backgrounds.
But this desire to reach varied audiences seems unconvincing in practice.
In the audience, Robin Le Priol, 30, director and environmental activist, recognizes that he "rarely meets people who are very far removed" from environmental defense issues.
Alexandra Bechikh, 22, a contemporary dance student, also believes she finds "always the same type of people" in this place: people between 23 and 45 years old, who live in Paris, already very knowledgeable on the subject.
“Amateurism”
Some “40,000 Parisian children since 2021 have been able to benefit from awareness raising” within the Climate Academy,” says Sarah Alby. That is, in the space of two years, less than one child in four in Paris .
An observation which makes the opposition within the municipal council cringe, which denounces "amateurism", given the sums committed to the project: two million euros of initial investment, plus one million euros of annual operation excluding salaries, according to figures communicated by the City of Paris.
“It looks like a big mess,” said municipal councilor LR Aurélien Véron.
“It’s not wasted money, because the climate is an important subject,” admits this representative of the municipal opposition, who however criticizes Sarah Alby for a “very biased vision” of the fight against global warming , accusing him of only inviting “militant decliners”.
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And to castigate the presence in these places of associations like Extinction Rebellion, Food Riposte or even the Earth Uprisings, three radical activist movements which, according to Aurélien Véron, "have regular recruitment and training meetings in this academy, even (who had) their head office for some time (...) in this municipal space".
For him, this is a breach of the “example” of neutrality that “a town hall like Paris” must show in the face of groups that “organize civil disobedience”.
Sarah Alby, on the contrary, assures that she is simply "mandated" to follow "a road map called the climate plan" for the city of Paris.
“These associations are not hosted at the Climate Academy,” she assures.
“Everything that is done at the Academy, including with these associations, is done with respect for the rule of law,” adds Patrick Bloche.
Determined to follow its roadmap, the Academy now wants to serve as an example by spreading elsewhere in France - notably in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, slips Patrick Bloche, alluding to a project in progress - and in the world.