• Announced in early April, the wish to create a new commune between the two cities of Seine-Saint-Denis was adopted during extraordinary municipal councils on Thursday.
  • After the merger, the new commune would have 150,000 inhabitants, which would make it the second like Ile-de-France, after Paris. It would weigh more heavily in public policy decisions.
  • Such a project could arouse the interest of other municipalities of Ile-de-France, lacking political weight.

The first step for the merger of the communes of Saint-Denis and Pierrefitte has just been taken. Announced at the beginning of April, the wish to create a new commune between the two cities of Seine-Saint-Denis was adopted during extraordinary municipal councils on Thursday 20 April. With its 150,000 inhabitants, the new town will be the second largest city in Ile-de-France, behind Paris. A position of strength, which should offer him enhanced skills. In the midst of an institutional recomposition, particularly with the Greater Paris metropolis under construction and with the new status of territorial public establishment (EPT) of Plaine Commune, these cities find themselves at the second level of intercommunality.

"The mayors of Saint-Denis and Pierrefitte surely say that decisions are no longer necessarily made at the municipal level and that together they will have more weight," says Léo Fauconnet, a researcher at the Paris Region Institute specializing in institutional issues and territorial reform. "The new municipality will weigh more in negotiations with the State, institutional partners and for obtaining European funds," confirms the mayor of Pierrefitte-sur-Seine, Michel Fourcade, in a statement.


CITY COUNCIL | The Municipal Council of Saint-Denis has voted a wish for the creation of a new municipality bringing together the two communities of Saint-Denis and @pierrefitte_93 pic.twitter.com/1IEC8Dn4dc

— City of Saint-Denis (@VilleSaintDenis) April 20, 2023

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Faced with a territorial recomposition issue that affects all future municipalities of Greater Paris, the initiative of two cities could inspire a renewed interest in the creation of new municipalities, which has lost momentum compared to the period 2016-2019.

"Perpetuate the life of municipalities that could no longer function"

But this prospect is not so obvious. "First of all, it is not in this type of territory [large municipalities] that we expect merger projects," says the researcher from the Paris Region Institute, who says he is "surprised" by the announcement.

The measure remains first of all a solution imagined to correct the French specificity of having a (too) large number of small municipalities on its territory (nearly 35,000). More "We have as many municipalities in France as in the rest of the European Union," he says. In theory, it allows cities lacking resources or with too few inhabitants to come together to work together.

"If the merger worked so well in our intercommunality, it is precisely because we had a complementarity between the municipalities lacking land and those lacking resources," explains Patrick Septiers, president of the community of communes Moret Seine and Loing (Seine-et-Marne). During his term of office, he merged five communes into a single new commune. "It was not the same logic as for these big cities, it was a question of perpetuating the life of municipalities that could no longer function alone," he adds.

Planned by a territorial reform dating from 2010, mergers of municipalities are experiencing a craze around 2015, motivated by "significant state aid," says Patrick Septiers. But in fact, between 2010 and 2022, only 2,500 municipalities have grouped together throughout the territory to form only 787. From now on, the Association of Mayors of France (AMF) lists only two merger projects underway in Ile-de-France, including that of Saint-Denis and Pierrefitte. "The second is located in the Val-d'Oise between Commeny and Gouzangrez" and would include about 700 inhabitants, details the AMF. So there is no question of a political project.

Asserting leadership

If other large municipalities in the Paris region were interested in merger projects, "it would be especially in other intercommunalities, which do not work well, and where there would be the need to assert leadership," says the researcher from the Paris Region Institute. The example of Évry-Courcouronnes, where the two municipalities were able to benefit from greater political weight, clearly demonstrates this. "We have inquired but there does not seem to be any other movement in this direction, says the director general of the association Intercommunalités de France, Floriane Boulay. But it is possible that mayors will think about it. »

"I think that the mayors of the Paris region will already try to make what exists, namely the intercommunalities, believes, for his part, Léo Fauconnet. There is still a form of delay on the issue, even more than for the new municipalities. Intercommunality refers to the different forms of cooperation between municipalities. And "thinking new common without thinking about its positioning in intercommunality" would be counterproductive, adds Floriane Boulay. An observation shared by the General Inspectorate of Administration (IGA), in its report published in September 2022, and entitled The new municipalities: a disappointing assessment, uncertain prospects.


It is therefore unlikely that a wave of new communes will invade Ile-de-France. This system is also regularly not well received by the inhabitants of the cities concerned. On several occasions, in Boulogne-Billancourt and Marne-la-Vallée, the merger projects initiated have never been completed. "It's not two mayors who decide alone," explains Floriane Boulay. We must succeed in creating a movement of the population in this direction. " One more challenge for those considering such a project.

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