Water leak, flying loads, cockroaches, rats, the nightmare of the residents of the Métairies residence in Sète
Certains habitants de la résidence des Métairies excédés par les conditions de vie dance les immeubles. Hélène Amiraux
La colère ne retombe pas dans la résidence de Métairies à Sète alors qu’une canalisation principale du collectif de 24 logements sociaux a cédé ce mardi 17 septembre 2024. Des locataires dénoncent leurs conditions de vie.
“We don't know what to do anymore, we're at an impasse!” Safia lives in the Métairies social housing residence, on avenue de la Source in Sète. And with several neighbors, tenants of this social housing building (24 apartments), she is at her wit's end, and above all very angry. A pipe has been leaking, like an open tap, at the foot of one of the facades, since 9 a.m. this Tuesday, September 17. It's almost 5pm that day and the water is still running and dangerously soaking the walls of the basement, which is infested with rats. "Nobody came!", laments her neighbor who reported the facts this morning by telephone and on the CDC Habitat website, without result. This is the straw that broke the camel's back.
This Tuesday, September 17, a main pipe in the building burst and water has been flowing freely for two days. Hélène Amiraux
"I've lived here for 42 years, I've never seen anything like it!"
According to the two women, this pipeline has been a problem for at least two years. These residents generally denounce the living conditions in this more than dilapidated residence (some balconies are crumbling) built in the 60s on a former army site.
Balconies are cracking in a worrying way. Hélène Amiraux
"We have been fighting for over three years to get work done, we send petitions, emails, I even filed a case with Adil, but nothing is happening", continues Safia. “I've lived here for 42 years, I've never seen anything like it. We're completely abandoned, left to our own devices, there's not even a trustee here anymore, says another resident, dejected. Everything here is dilapidated. I live in a 3-room apartment, this year I was asked to regularize a surplus of 350 euros for water! “I had someone come to see if there was a leak in my house, but he didn't find anything. There are leaks in the building and they made some tenants pay,” says this woman who lives alone. Her neighbor's water bills are also skyrocketing. For the past two years, she has had to settle 900 euros in water charges at the end of the year, she confides.
A 2000 euro electricity bill last winter
Cracks are breaking through the walls, balconies and roof. Safia describes the apartments as real thermal sieves. “The apartments are not insulated. In the summer, it is 40 °C in the apartments and in the winter it is – 5 °C", explains Safia whose rent is 430 €. "I have to put the radiator on 30 °C to warm the room and if I turn it off for just half an hour, the house is frozen!", adds another neighbor. "I had a 2000 euro gas and electricity bill last winter, I can't afford to start another year like that”, says Safia, who lives in a two-bedroom apartment infested with cockroaches – even in the rotting partitions – which she has to clean by the shovelful every day, despite the intervention of a pest controller.
Cockroaches nest in the partitions. Hélène Amiraux
Cockroaches are being collected by the shovelful in some homes. Hélène Amiraux
“My daughter caught salmonella”
Mold is invading the walls and joints. “My 7-year-old daughter got salmonella in June from cockroaches. She spent a week in the hospital. She also has asthma from the humidity. The doctor told us we had to move.” An inspection a few months ago showed the presence of asbestos in the housing, some of which are very dilapidated. One more worry. Safia and her neighbors despair of ever seeing the renovation work being carried out. The former, in despair, applied for a transfer. That was a year ago. This Wednesday, the leak had still not been repaired.
A rehabilitation project on standby
CDC Habitat Sud Ouest, owner of the Métairies residence since 2007, has been contacted and announced this Wednesday that it is “"listening to tenants […] but also seeking solutions." The lessor states that the company Servimo a été missioned "in emergency” to repair the localized water leak “on the main built-in/buried supply network and therefore difficult to access. […] We can't cut off the water without cutting off the general supply to the entire building." CDC assures that an intervention is scheduled for this Thursday "and will only require two days of work".
As for the exorbitant water consumption that this generates: “We are closely monitoring the readings of the main meter to deduce the consumption linked to this leak during the regularization of charges 2024″, assures the lessor. As for the increase in water bills in recent years, CDC puts this down to a “higher” consumption by residents. This is something the residents dispute.
A rehabilitation program for the residence is planned for amounting to 900,000 euros, mainly on the exterior insulation of the building, under the ground floor floors and the roof. But this work depends on the extension beyond the June 2027 expiry date of the emphyteutic lease of the land, between the State and the City of Sète. “Discussions are ongoing”, says CDC Habitat. Cracks are indeed observed in the roof, indicates the lessor, “this does not seem to harm the solidity of the structure”.
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