Must confess, the original Secretaire seemed a bit stand-offish, but it turned out she was very shy… very knowledgeable, excellent person… but her shyness was difficult to overcome … and, of course, me not speaking much French in those days certainly didn’t help.
When she retired and our current Secretaire transferred to us it was like chalk and cheese… immediately friendly… very knowledgeable… and speaking just enough English to feel at ease with us foreigners…
the ex-secretaire has since become a good friend… finally at ease with this mad Englishwoman…
However one should also be aware that even if the Maire, or Mairie, says that what you want to do is fine they don’t have the final word. They can be overruled higher up the chain. If what one wants to is for example critical to a decision to purchase then seek a certificat d’urbanisme operational”first.
I say, time and again… go to the Mairie and discuss what you hope to achieve… that is the first step… and especially important if Purchase is involved as Jane says (as we all say…)
Of course, I’m not meaning that this is at the whim of the Maire or the Mairie … there are Rules which govern Planning/Urbanism and what one can and can’t do.
What I am saying is at the Mairie there will be someone who has the training to know these Rules and to advise how one can achieve what one wants (if at all possible).
If the local Mairie is too small to have such a person… there will probably be a larger Mairie nearby which handles such enquiries… the local Mairie will know where one should go…
Unfortunately the world is changing (and in our case not for the better) and I’m with @JaneJones and @graham - we’ve seen things change in 15 years. Our original complete restoration of our cottage involved a chat with the secretary at the mairie who told us to go to the planning officer at the sub-prefecture. We had a face to face meeting with the planning officer and she told us what we could do and within three months we were in the ground.
We now want to extend and also restore a hanger. Our (new) mayor is “ravi” about our plans. The (new) secretary gave us the name of the (new) planning officer who refuses to have any contact except by email and voice mail, which she does not reply to. Four months on, our plans have disappeared into a black hole of non-communication and the new mayor has no influence what-so- ever.
I would suggest, as I did up the topic to the OP, to seek the help of a maître d’œvre in getting your plans in to the planners… they are usually well known in those circles and as professionals are well regarded. They don’t cost too much either and you don’t have to take their “full” service which includes a %age of the contract value for managing it.
At a minimum the Secretaire is someone who will open the mail and move things on to wherever/whomever… and quite possibly that Mairie will only be open part-time…
And going up the scale, the Secretaire is trained in a wide range of responsibilities including Accounting/Planning/and heaven knows what… and should be able to advise an Applicant on what documents need completing and (hopefully) some helpful hints on how to complete 'em… before getting said documents moved “up the line”…
there are all sorts of levels and it doesn’t take one very long to learn that visiting xyz “is a waste of time” (no matter how charming the encounter) and better to take a slight detour and visit bdf where one will get better info (perhaps from a harridan, perhaps from a charming individual… ).
Quite possibly the person is unable to be more helpful…
So much is on-line these days… when our internet goes down the Secretaire is at a loss… and tearing her hair out … due to the inability to get her work done.
The previous lady, sailed serenely through, since her major-mishap would be if the telephone stopped ringing due to a line-down somewhere.
Of course, this had a silver lining since she then could do her work (manually, of course) without interruption…
I recall going to collect something from the Vienne some years ago and the lines were down (a farmer had pulled the lines down and sliced through them with his tractor bucket). It seems that Orange were going to be some time fixing it, so the maire and a couple of mates (probably the offending farmer) were busying themselves sat in the ditch matching the coloured wires and taping them up together
That’s fine Stella, but if you’ve got a Maire that that ‘hides’ in his office if he hears you speak English, and changes the secretaries all the time it’s very difficult. I’ve been in many times but have now given up, the last time was when I went to complete a permit for a bonfire & the secretary has to ask soneone else about the form. I don’t think they are given any training but as they don’t stay I have no idea what’s going on. I am very envious of you - cn I move to your commune please?
Sounds like you got a receptionist. The nearest large town has a much bigger Mairie obviously (we are 500+ souls against their 4k) and it has at least 2 receptionists, who can be quite difficult (protective perhaps). Thankfully, I know just what to say to get past them and speak with whoever I actually need to be with…
On the other hand, over in Charente… at a very large town…
I’d spoken on the telephone with the Receptionist before my arrival… and she greeted me like an old friend when we were face to face…
At her bidding, I waited quietly until the person I needed to meet was available.
A gent came out of one of the offices, came over and asked if I was being dealt with…
we ended up chatting about this and that and when he heard which village I was from we were instant best-friends.
Turned out he was M le Maire and seems he knows my Maire very well although we are a few hundred km away… small world.
Worth noting he was polite and helpful before knowing just who I was…
Maybe your Maire speaks no English, or bad English he is ashamed of, maybe his English teacher at school was horrible. Maybe if you live in France you could speak a bit of French.
Edited to add my last sentence wasn’t intended in a mean way, just bear in mind a village maire is an ordinary citizen who doesn’t necessarily have any special qualifications or a stellar academic career and may well be flustered and uncomfortable when foreigners talk at him or her in foreign. .
Why should we all speak English anyway, Spanish or Dutch or Arabic etc speakers don’t expect us to understand them.
Secrétaires de Mairie are civil servants and have to do a competitive exam to get the job, if you got someone clueless it won’t be a S de M but a receptionist as Stella says.
When we’ve been in to the Marie, we always speak French (however bad), I also write out a page of what I am trying to say & give this to them to help. I can understand more than I can speak, most of the time it’s the pronouncing of words I have trouble with. Taking a ‘script’ often helps. Do you think it’s worth going to the Marie at our nearest largish village? He has a reputation as very pro-active, pro English as they buy all the empty houses in his village & renovate them!
T
Our commune is the same. I sometimes think Stella lives in a world full of rose petals as bears so little relation to our experiences.
Secrétaires are civil servants, and can be moved around but rarely dispensed with altogether. A big issue as there is a large cohort of useless ones who refuse training. Ours also happens to be the mother of a member of the conseille ( which strikes me as a conflict of interest) and not a word can be said against her. A friend and neighbour is also an ex-secrétaire, but she actually had the grace to take retirement. She said that she was being asked to learn things she had no interest in, and found the changes to everything being online too complicated.
I wouldn’t unless you are very sure about the relationship between your maire and this one. You could get caught in the cross-fire. Far better would be to see if you can book an appointment with the local planners at the next level up if you have concerns, or as Graham says get someone else to run this for you.
But I do wonder whether you are over complicating this? If 20m2 it is a declaration only, so you might as well just whack it in. If you can get an architect to draw you a smart plan, and fill in the form correctly then you should be fine.
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