Posted on Jul 9, 2020 at 8:00 a.m.
From July 9, households in Seine-Saint-Denis who find it difficult to pay their rents will be able to submit a request for exceptional assistance. The department announced the creation of an emergency fund to avoid the risk of rental debt for part of the population. In a territory where the toll paid to Covid-19 has been very heavy, with excess mortality which jumped by nearly 130% between March 1 and April 27, 2020 compared to the same period in 2019, elected officials want to try to ” stem the risk of a generalized economic and social crisis.
“We want to prevent at all costs that some households who have made it up until now drop out and fall into poverty”, explains to the “Echos” Stéphane Troussel, president (PS) of Seine-Saint-Denis. However, the risk is real. According to the surveys of Seine-Saint-Denis Habitat, the first social landlord of 93 with 32,000 tenants, 2,500 households constituted an average debt of 500 euros each during confinement.
This exceptional fund, which will be submitted to the vote of the departmental council on July 9, will be endowed with 2 million euros paid by the department. Seine-Saint-Denis Habitat has committed its side to the tune of one million, while “CAF93 has also expressed its willingness to participate financially in this collective effort”, according to Seine-Saint-Denis. “If we arrive at an amount of 4 million euros, this fund will be able to finance aid of 480 euros (capped at 60% of rent) for 8,000 families”, says Stéphane Troussel, who is still trying to convince other funders.
The department of Seine-Saint-Denis votes a stimulus plan to 55 million euros
The rental payment aid is part of a recovery plan of 55 million euros that the Department voted on July 8. Already marked by one of the highest poverty rates in France, Seine-Saint-Denis is one of the three departments most affected by mortality linked to Covid-19. The “Solidarity and Ecological Recovery Plan” should help get out of the crisis. “It seemed absolutely essential to us, after these difficult last months, to help revive sectors with strong dynamics for Seine-Saint-Denis and for the benefit of its inhabitants” insists Stéphane Troussel, president (PS) of the Department. Three areas will be particularly targeted: solidarity (increase in the Solidarity Fund for Housing (FSL) and direct aid, self-employed people, digital support), aid for actors in the social and solidarity economy, support for projects in the ecological transition. “This rebound plan is first and foremost the choice of action. I now expect the State to support our long-term effort and not abandon us in the revival of our territory, ”says Stéphane Troussel.
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Public and private park
Once validated, at the end of an instruction period “of one month maximum”, the aid will be paid in one go to the third donor. This emergency fund comes in addition to the Housing Solidarity Fund (FSL) which helps, for a budget of 2.5 million euros per year in 93, the households most in difficulty to pay all or part of their rent. . It will concern in particular assets, tenants of the public or private park. To qualify, households will have to justify a loss of 20% of their resources during the health crisis over the three months from March to May and whose rate of effort devoted to the payment of rent was + 30% before confinement. and / or more than 40% at the time of the request. “But this device will not be sufficient” underlines Stéphane Troussel, who demands from the State a revaluation of the APL, the extension of the winter truce until the summer of 2021 and an abundance of departmental FSL to face this unprecedented crisis .
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