Several mobilizations of local residents were organized this weekend in Paris against the opening of new consumption rooms with lower risks (SCMR) for crack users. In the 20th, where the project to install a treatment room for drug addicts divides, but also in the 10th.
Several dozen people demonstrated on Saturday in front of the Bonne Nouvelle post office, to denounce the possible imminent opening of two new consumption rooms at lower risks (SCMR) in the 10th arrondissement. And even if the project is far from being finalized, residents are already mobilized to prevent it from becoming a reality.
The cause of their anger? The letter from the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, sent to the Prime Minister, Jean Castex, on August 30, about “issues relating to street drug addiction”. In this letter, the Parisian city councilor offers the head of government “4 solutions” to better support drug addicts in great need who live mainly in the north-east of Paris.
Towards the opening of two new SCMRs?
Among them, the elected socialist explains that “two sites in the Grands Boulevards district” – without giving the address – were “identified” to “accommodate integrated care spaces to get crack users out of the Street”. And to specify that one of the two sites in question could be “operational before the end of the year”.
A project that particularly worries residents, who denounce the opening of a second SCMR in a district that already has one and who fear seeing the problem of street consumption moving in their neighborhood. Together they launched a petition on change.org, saying “no to the multiplication of shooting rooms in the 10th district”.
A petition, signed by less than 350 people this Sunday afternoon, in which they express their anger at a project for which neither “residents, collectives, associations and elected officials” have “been consulted, or even informed”, and this, while it is, according to them, “infrastructures already known to have deleterious effects on the safety and the daily life of the residents”. Criticizing a “denial of participatory democracy”, they do not want to see the 10th “become the district of shooting rooms and reception centers for drug addicts”.
And to quote the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, who asks that “everyone take their part”, to dispute that there is already an SCMR in the 10th as well as “3 reception and support centers for reduction risks for drug users (CAARUD) out of the 11 that exist in Paris “,” 2 CAARUD mobile units stationed at Stalingrad, Gare de l’Est, Gare du Nord, Château Landon and La Chapelle “, as well as” an addictology care and support and prevention center (CSAPA) ”.
A “shoot room” has a significant impact on the life of a neighborhood.
Yet this summer @Anne_Hidalgo and @ACORDEBARD have secretly decided to open 2 new rooms in the 10th, in addition to that of # Lariboisière.
We won’t let you do this# OverdoseParis10 pic.twitter.com/ZkD3qCVlkT
– Bertil Fort (@BertilFort) September 10, 2021
By their side, the elected LR Bertil Fort, member of the Changer Paris group at the Paris Council and close to Rachida Dati, wrote a letter to the mayor of the 10th arrondissement, asking him “to communicate the exact locations […] retained with the mayor of Paris “, but also” to say which of the two rooms has been identified as operational by the end of the year “and finally,” to organize a debate on the subject “at the next council of district scheduled for September 28. A letter that has remained unanswered to this day.