Residents association meeting 2008 - La réunion de l’association 2008

Last night was the resident association meeting and it went well. As always, there were some crazy, heated moments but there seems to be a new consensus that everyone will pay to redo the roads and sidewalks. Part of the impetus is that the value added tax in France on these projects is 5.5% now but will jump up to 19.8% after next year. That means we would had to pay more for the same work after that.

The road work comes out to be EUR 3200 (USD 4800) per house and less for the apartments. It makes the additional cost of a fibre rollout at the same time seem pretty small. At one point the engineer was explaining how they would dig the road and re-install the electrical conduit in the roads to reach the lamp posts. One of the older residents raised her hand and asked where the fibre optic conduit was going to be put! I was thrilled because she was looking forward to it.

I spoke up and explained that we will likely use the existing conduit but may need to cross streets with new conduit in certain places. That can be done at the same time they are doing the road work. I have very little time left (only 2-3 months) to get things ready before we vote officially on the road work. I need to have a proposal ready for them before the vote and I'm translating a handout right now which I'll pass out to all homes in the next week or two. I'll post the handout shortly.