Will there be a crazed mob at the illegal market in Belleville?

I'm a former council member, and still an active participant, in the Conseil de quartier de Belleville. A conseil de quartier is a neighborhood council or community board which seeks to link inhabitants, businesses and visitors to a neighborhood with the local government and other official bodies. It is supposed to propose projects, bring people together, let grievances be heard, suggest solutions, organize concrete actions. Belleville is one of the 7 Conseils of the 20th Arrondissement of Paris, and covers a territory with over 20,000 people. Members are volunteers, drawn from among the lists of registered voters, designated by local associations, named by the political parties present in the Conseil d'arrondissement of the 20th.

About three times a year a public meeting is held. They usually attract a group of 50 regulars, sometimes the double if a point of great public interest is on the agenda. More often than not, these become occasions for residents to complain about crime, violence, dirty streets, dog poop, and the like, taking advantage of the presence of local elected officials, usually including the mayor.

The agenda for tonight's meeting didn't look very attractive, so I didn't anticipate to find many people in the elementary school activities room. To my great surprise, it was packed with hundreds of people, more than I've ever seen at a public meeting in the 20th. The reason was not a status report on construction projects in the neighborhood, nor an update on outstanding grievances, but rather, the "marché de la misère".

I write "marché de la misèré" but in doing so, I'm making a political choice. This "market" is located on the boulevard de Belleville and surrounding streets. It is an illegal market that began as a "marché des biffins". Biffins or chiffoniers are scavengers who resell "found" objects from the street and garbage cans. Among them you can also find old people who slowly sell off their meager store of personal effecst to earn a few euros.

That's how this market started about three years ago, with a push from the great recession. In our neighborhood, there are some "traditional" biffins, but the ones I see in the garbage cans of my own building are Chinese, illegal immigrants who earn a pittance by finding objects in the garbage, cleaning them, fixing them, and selling them on the street.

Once they settled in, supported by many soft-hearted people who couldn't imagine depriving poor people from making a few euros, and offering other poor people clothing or other items they could never afford new, they were quickly overwhelmed by other kinds of merchants, selling stolen goods, contraband (cigarettes, in particular), drugs and more. They have invaded the center platform of the boulevard and the wide sidewalks on either side. They threaten local people, they have caused great harm to the already suffering businesses located on the boulevard, they fight among themselves, the shit and piss on the street or in the lobbies of the surrounding buildings, they leave the streets covered with waste, spit, vomit, and worse.

The neighbors, as you can imagine, are irate. Last year, after many protests, the French government in the form of the Police Prefect finally sent in the riot police, bringing a brigade from far-off Montauban to provide a non-stop presence on the boulevard. The illegal market moved, until the riot police left. After that they quickly returned, first to the area around the Belleville métro station. When the Police Prefect finally decided to react to ongoing problems of the neighborhood around the métro by creating a special territorial brigade, the illegal market simply moved down the boulevard a bit, away from the territory covered by the new brigade, which in any case lacked the numbers and equipment to dissuade the "merchants" from setting up shop ("shop"is usually a dirty sheet on the pavement, where goods, which now include raw meat, are sold off the ground).

It's a situation totally out of hand, made worse by a legitimate feeling that it would never be allowed in the wealthier parts of the city. Poverty and crime are acceptable in the East, unimaginable in the West. Nor are people satisfied with the hot potato treatment this matter receives. The boulevard divides the 11th and the 20th, and on the otherside of métro Belleville you find the 10th and the 19th. The special police brigade can't act, the police of the 11th tell the police of the 20th to act, the police say they can't act anyway, since this activity is only a "contravention" and not a "délit", limiting the kind of response they can make. The mayor of the 20th asks the mayor of Paris to act, the mayors respond that they don't have control over the police (which is true: Paris, Lyon and Marseille don't have local police, but only national police, under direct control of the Ministry of the Interior), the police say they don't have the resources, bla bla bla and in the meantime the people are getting angry.

And so a huge crowd was present tonight, and the regular agenda was swept away by a giant bitch fest. What was done in the period when the riot police were present to ensure a long-term solution? What solutions does the mayor have?

Among those speaking, we heard a Green party member. They are among the softies the mayor laid into in her opening remarks, saying that there were dissensions in her majority, which includes the Greens. When the Green guy said that they had been talking to a variety of people, and he said that among those persons were "researchers in social sciences", the room started to boo. American-style anti-intellectalism? Perhaps. Certainly frustration that this was not a situation to be studied, but a problem to be solved. Local business threatened to close shop for a day: Belleville, quartier mort. Others brought up the coming elections next year, and threatened that Belleville, which has been a stronghold for the left, would abandon both the city's socialist majority and the state's Sarkozist majority, and vote for the neofascist right. It's not an idle threat: there is such great frustration with the parties in power locally and nationally, that an extremist vote is quite possible, even here.

The mayor of the 20th offered her "solutions". First, to get the riot police back. To do so, she is supporting the "Belleville quartier mort" plan, and calling for a mass demonstration against the Police Prefect and the State Prefect. She has obtained funding for a "ressourcerie", a recycling center that would be located at the Porte de Montreuil, the other part of the 20th affected by this problem. And she is seeking funding for a renovation of the boulevard, which the Conseil de quartier has been calling for for over three years, and for which we have organized any number of public meetings and workshops, carried out a survey, held a street party, etc., and which the mayor of the 20th has consistently ignored, claiming that the city of Paris has no money (a lie).

I left the meeting at this point, in part because I feared fainting in the stifling heat of an unseasonally warm spring day, in a room stuffed with hundreds of people instead of the few dozen children who usually occupy it.

And I can't help but fear that sooner or later, if the situation doesn't change, the locals will get out their crowbars and baseball bats, and blood will flow...


http://www.leparisien.fr/paris-75/paris-75011/belleville-excede-par-le-marche-de-la-misere-09-09-2009-632107.php

http://www.leparisien.fr/paris-75/paris-75011/le-marche-clandestin-de-belleville-interdit-08-10-2009-666534.php

http://www.leparisien.fr/abo-paris/les-marches-de-la-misere-de-retour-a-belleville-28-03-2010-865912.php

http://www.bellevillecouronnes.com/

http://www.evous.fr/Paris-Belleville-dans-la-tourmente,1145314.html

http://www.le75011.fr/paris-XIe-75011-11e-arrondissement/vie-locale/economie/3571-marche-sauvage-biffins-rue-faubourg-temple

http://www.bastamag.net/article1432.html

10 May 2011: News of the day

I'm reading Le Parisien, and here're my reactions:

It's "le dix mai" (May 10), a date that needs no year. It refers back to 1981 and the first victory of the left in post-war France, with the election of François Mitterrand. We've had an onslought of media coverage of the 30th anniversary. Le Parisien even does a story about his legacy in the little street where he had his private apartment.

A profile of Jeff Mills, "the king of techno", a Detroiter based in Chicago who after living in Berlin has now moved to the ultrachic 7th Arrondissement of Paris. He says that he is a victim of racism in the US, where blacks are only allowed to do rap. (?) He is well known in France, and is doing a live musical accompaniment to film The Fantastic Voyage at the cité de la Musique. (Kind of pricey, but I would like to see that... I love the film!)

Uproad over Laurent Wasquiez's trial balloon for workfare. The founder of the current general assistance program (RSA), a nice guy who let himself be used by Sarkozy, slams Wasquiez: cities can offer part-time work to people on RSA, under normal legal conditions. Wasquiez should know this, as he (like just about every other minister) is a mayor of a town. Nor is it true that you can earn more on RSA and other welfare schemes than by working at the minimum wage, as Wasquiez claims. The minister who is supposed to deal with these things, the wonderful Roselyne Bachelot, also puts Waskie in his place.

In the ranking of commercial brands (the one where Apple topped Google), France saves face thanks to luxury brands. Well, if they HADN'T what would that have meant?

More on the police officer stabbed yesterday. Disgusting. The victim of the theft and the policeman chasing the thief were mobbed by the sellers of black-market cigarettes. Of course, the sellers wouldn't be there if there were no customers...

Omar Haddad, found guilty of killing his employer in a kangaroo court (the only "proof" was a message on the wall of the cellar where the woman was killed, written in her blood, saying "Omar ma tuer" in bad French, had his sentence reduced by the president. But there's now hope for a retrial, with a court accepting his lawyer's request that the blood samples be reanalyzed. Apparently there was the blood of a man mixed with that of the victim, but the French "justice" system never bothered to require a DNA analysis...

The appeals trial of the beautiful scumbag Villepin continues, with important testimony that shows he has committed perjury.

The affair of racism in the French Football Federation will be quietly snuffed out. A scapegoat will be mildly punished, as will the whistleblower. All is well. Move along, folks.

Apparentl students who have done literary studies are now attractive to corporations. This would be a big change in France, where engineering degrees via the parallel system of Grandes Ecoles have always dominated hiring and management structures. The are more flexible, more autonomous, more open, than engineers. They are better analysts, and are better able to summarize situations.

We learn more about the "tubes de l'été". This is a French tradition in which TV networks choose a song that they will promote the hell out of to make the hit of the summer. I don't get it.

TF1 abandons tropical rythyms (sp) for (crappy) Breton sea shanties:

Les Marins d'Iroise: LA MER TAPE FORT par basquin

France 3 has chosen Jehro:

9 May 2011: News of the day

What I've seen in Le Parisien today.

Velcom, the free bike rental scheme in the northern suburbs of La Plaine Commune (St Denis and surrounding towns), is a flop. Vandalism and theft resulted in all bikes being removed from stations a few months ago. The ones in good shape were put back recently after having computer chips installed to help track them (not sure how that works). They, too, are being vandalized and stolen, so it looks like the whole expensive scheme is going to be put to an end. Even in moderately more civilized Paris, Vélib suffers far more vandalism and theft than planners expected (but less than Jimmy said would happen, but he's very pessimistic about people in general and Parisians in particular).

A policeman, chasing a purse snatcher, was stabbed (as was the victim of the purse snatching). Took place in the capital of Parisian crime, contraband, drug dealing, etc., Barbès.

French notaries do far more than just witness signatures. They are more like lawyers, in charge of all matters dealing with real estate, inheritance, etc. There are less than 10,000 notaries, but they do more than 5 million euros in business each year. Their use is required in many types of contracts. They are private, but operate under a public mandate, and are often accused of cheating, lying, embezzling, etc. They are a clique subject to their own rules and their own justice system. A new book is out claiming that recent government procedures granting notary status to people were illegal (mostly for technicalities), meaning that the people named as notaries aren't notaries, and that all the contracts they've worked on can be contested in court.

The very studly minister for European Affairs Laurent Wauquiez wants to introduce workfare in France. Why not? Except of course that it would cost a fortune to administer it.

Italians fear a huge earthquake in Rome on Wednesday, based on the prediction of Mussolini's astrologer or something. Hee.

François Blaquart, the national technical director of the French Football Federation, is very hurt that people would take his racist proposals for French football as meaning he is a racist. He might even let himself be fired!

Le Parisien give suggestions to national team coach Laurent Blanc on how he can defend himself during his deposition in the investigation on the racist quotas in French football. Thanks, Le Parisien! That's certainly the role of a newspaper.

In a solemn and emotional ceremony, the Mayor of Rouen presented the NZ Ambassador to France with a mummified Maori head from the city's museum, so that it can be returned to Aotearoa to be buried in its tribal lands.

A group of buildings in the very chic St Germain des Près neighborhood, formerly occupied by the French Customs service, have been sold to private investors. The buildings included listed monuments, and have been carefully restored, but with the most modern equipment (raised floors for AC and cabling, etc.). The architects note that the government agents were very hard on the building, requiring a large investment to restore the buildings. But I thought that only public ownership was able to preserve France's historical heritage??? Private bad, public good, right? Note that the new owners are not only private, but they're a private equity fund, the Carlyle Group, from AMERICA! Horrors!

A tale of two accents

Listening to NPR's Talk of the Nation, and have heard two guests with strange accents.

The first is military historian Jim Lacey, who has written about the battle of Marathon. He speaks with this ztrong urban (Brooklyn? Joisey?) accent*, and insists on saying "calvary" for "cavalry". There's really a shocking contrast between what he's saying and his accent. He is a former infantry officer, so came to his position in writing and academia in an untraditional fashion.
Listen HERE: http://www.npr.org/2011/04/25/135710868/the-clash-at-marathon-shaped-greece-and-the-west


The second is Francis Everitt, who has the plummiest of English accents as he discusses his reasearch proving Einstein right. He seems intent on stuffing as many "ones" as possible. He sounds like Prince Charles' scientifically sound (but equally pompous) twin.
Listen yourself HERE: http://www.npr.org/2011/05/06/136057344/proof-that-einstein-got-it-right

*It's Brooklyn.

Slate Corrections scorecard

http://www.slate.com/id/2293108/

In the May 4 "Politics," John Dickerson incorrectly described President Bush's 2004 poll numbers as being from 2003.
Corrections guy gets 12/10 on the Doofometer cuz the MISTAKE HASN'T BEEN CORRECTED:
In the text: "In December 2003, Americans were concerned about the economy but their mood was improving.*"
At the bottom of the page: "Correction, May 5, 2011: Originally this article incorrectly stated that the Bush poll numbers were from December 2003. (Return to the corrected sentence.)"
Dickerson gets a 6/10. I don't think it changes much to his story, but since the whole point is about comparing poll numbers for different presidents at different times, he needed to be careful.

In the May 4 "Press Box," Jack Shafer misspelled the last name of Neda Salehi Agha Soltan.
Doofometer: 1/10. Weird name, it's OK to get it wrong.

In the May 3 "Jurisprudence," Simon Lazarus incorrectly referred to Rep. Paul Ryan's budget resolution, passed by the House in April. All such references should have been to Ryan's "Roadmap for America's Future," an earlier proposal that is more detailed than the budget resolution.
Doofometer: 9/10. I can see the mistake, but the entire article was about this document. Do you not know what document you were analyzing???

In a May 3 "XX Factor" post, K.J. Dell'Antonia misspelled the name of Atlanta law firm King & Spalding.
Doofometer: 4/10. I would give this a lower score, but how hard is it to spell "King & Spalding"? What did she write: Spaulding?

In the May 2 "Explainer," Brian Palmer incorrectly identified Yuri Andropov as Soviet premier in 1970. In fact, he was head of the KGB at that time, and did not become general secretary of the Communist Party until 1982.
Doofometer: 5/10. I would think that the beary presence of Brezhnev would have burned itself into ones member over the period 1964 to 1982 (then again, for a person my age, Brezhnev was the about the only premier we ever knew).

In the May 2 "Politics," John Dickerson described Osama Bin Laden's compound as being "35 minutes outside Islamabad." It's 35 miles from the city but would require a considerably lengthier trip.
Doofometer: 7/10. There was another error, where he said it was 90 miles from Islamabad. I give this a high score because "15 minutes from" means something when you say "by car" and its "from Slate HQ in Washington". It could be 15 minutes but a fast car, or a slow helicopter, or by extreme pogosticking...

In the April 29, "Science," Brian Palmer noted that, in the development of written communication, individual characters eventually came to stand in for "letters" rather than syllables. To be more precise, individual characters came to stand in for the sounds with which modern speakers identify letters.
Doofometer: 2/10. We knew what he meant.

In an April 27 "XX Factor" post, K.J. Dell'Antonia misspelled the first name of Garry Trudeau.
Doofometer: 4/10. A minor error, but the guy's name is in your magazine every single day.

In an April 26 "XX Factor" post, Jessica Grose misidentified the Beastie Boys album Licensed To Ill as License To Ill.
Doofometer: 1/10. Who wouldn't make this mistake?

Advice Illustrated: Mother's Day

Letter 1 is from a woman whose mother is a racist, obnoxious, vulgar and ill-mannered boor who's having a bad effect on LW's children. Prudie says that LW is doing the right thing to teach the kids that they can love their grandmother without approving her manners. But the racism is a big no-no. If she opens her racist mouth, she's not seeing the kids. I say, yeah.

Video letter is from a woman who owns two cutesy doggies and is irritated by the people who comment on them when she walks them. Prudie tells LW she knew what she was doing when she acquired the cute doggies. I say: Find that neighbor who sat on the out-of-control dog and your problem will be solved.

Letter 2 is from a mother whose adult daughter is unresponsive to her attempts to communicate. Prudie says to send a last email saying LW will no longer bother the daughter, but is looking forward to daughter initiating contact again. As for me, I wonder about those gifts. Those are fabulous, touching, heartfelt gifts. I wouldn't know how to equal them. Could it be as simple as that? You gave excessively awesome gifts.

Letter 3 is from a guy who knocked up a colleague and married her. Wife is bat-shit crazy about his mother, who is a perfectly nice woman. Prudie says he needs pschological support, and to acknowledge to his mother that his wife is nuts. I say: Men, use the damn condom and make sure the woman you bonk is using something too. No kid, no marriage to crazy women, no MIL issues. But now that you're married and a dad and all... but why is the assumption that MIL is innocent? Some people are capable of being really nasty out of sight when they need to be. And in this case, I can imagine MIL thinking: "The bitch trapped my baby boy!", and behaving accordingly.

Letter 4 is from a woman who doesn't get along with her mother. But her father's partner is adorable. Can she give this woman a mother's day gift? Prudie says, yes, but this can also be an opportunity to reach out to her mother. I say: Give it up Prudie. She said nothing about wanting to be in contact with her mother. And yes, your mother is the person who mothers you. (That's for Cam on Modern Family).

Slate Corrections scorecard

Week 17 of 2011
http://www.slate.com/id/2292400/

In the April 28 "War Stories," Fred Kaplan wrote that Gen. David Petraeus would soon resign from the military. Petraeus will soon retire from the military.
Doofometer score: 3/10 He's leaving, and that's what's important.

In an April 27 "Politics," David Weigel referred to big Republican wins "in 2011." The party's gains were in the 2010 election.
Doofometer score: 4/10 Weigel's a political commentator, so he knows when elections take place. But the effect of those elections was in 2011, and I don't see much harm.

In the April 26 "Green Room," Matthew Fuhrmann mistakenly stated that an accident at India's Rajasthan Atomic Power Station released radioactive helium. The helium was not radioactive, though the accident did release heavy water.
Doofometer score: 9/10 Radioactive isotopes of helium decay instantly. There is no connection between heavy water and radioactive helium. Lame, wrong, and kind of pertinent.

In the April 26 "Project Syndicate," Simon Johnson misspelled the last name of former Citigroup chairman Sandy Weill.
Doofometer score: 2/10 Weil, Wyle, Weill...

In an April 26 "Slatest" item, Josh Voorhees stated that Tim Pawlenty is the former governor of Pennsylvania. He is the former governor of Minnesota.
Doofometer score: 6/10 Kind of basic info.

In the April 25 "Politics," David Weigel misstated the university that hosts the Scripps Survey Research Center. It is Ohio University, not Ohio State.
Doofometer score: 4/10 Significant, but Ohio shares the blame: normal states (like their neighbor to the north) have University of X and X State University.

In the April 20 "Technology," Steven I. Weiss incorrectly stated that David Hobby's cross-country tour was sold out. It was nearly sold out.
Doofometer score: 1/10 Not important, and not a big mistake.