These two days have been opened by a plenary session in the presence of Audrey Linkenheld and Charles Proy, President of the OFS Métropole Lilloise. During this session, various stakeholders involved in the development of the OFS (municipalities, cooperative operators, EPF, notaries) shared their feedbacks related to their own experience. According to Audrey Linkenheld, “the OFS-BRS model only makes sense if it is part of local housing policy.”
National support for the OFS
The “Foncier Solidaire France” network was subsequently formally launched by Julien Denormandie, Minister to the Minister of Cohesion of the Territories, in charge of the City and Housing. The network seeks to foster the exchange of experience between the OFS and be a force for bringing forward proposals to the Ministry. Julien Denormandie, therefore, has "engaged in the promotion of this new model of sustainable housing production affordable" and reiterated its support for "what is best to fight against land inflation".
A network as an opportunity to discuss a number of topics and raised key conclusions
On Thursday afternoon and Friday morning, twelve workshops were held and contributed to the promotion of the OFS and BRS in France. Participants exchanged their experience, shared their feedbacks and discussed a number of topics. In particular, they raised the issues of implementing favourable affordable public policies, of taxation and BRS legislation, of the legal and economic OFS models, of the OFS financing and implementation in the early stages, of the accompaniment of the beneficiaries of the constitution of an accreditation package (compulsory for the OFS recognition), of the bank mobilization, etc.
In the end, these two days brought together nearly 200 people to move actions and discussions forward. Following the workshops, members of the network raised watchpoints, areas for future action and issues to look out such as:
- OFS mobilization in the sale of subsidised housing (HLM)
- Long-term bank mobilization
- OFS taxation in order to secure economic models
- Accelerate the mobilisation of the “Caisse des Dépôts” (public housing subsidiary) through land purchase support (GAIA loan)
A complete report will be soon released expressing propositions and key conclusions. Next steps for the network The network will gather propositions from its members including regulatory and tax provisions and forward their recommendations to the national level. The network will also work to welcome new OFS in order to expand the movement.