The insoluble conflict of suburban schools

L’Œuvre reported this curious conflict that pits the municipalities of Champigny and Joinville against each other because children living in the territory of the former attend schools maintained at the expense of the latter.
This earned us two letters:
“In all the schools of Champigny,” wrote the mayor, Mr. Dumont, “we receive children from Saint-Maur, Chennevières, Villiers and Plessis, without ever asking for any fees. “We even have to enlarge the schools of Couilly: the project has been at the prefecture for three years and the cost is 880,000 francs, without personnel costs. We are currently obliged to make a classroom under the covered playgrounds. We have also bought land in Tremblay, worrying only about one thing: the application of the 1882 law on compulsory education and accessible to all.

Mr. Vel-Durand, Mayor of Joinville, tells us for his part:
"The boundary between Joinville and Champigny was drawn more than a century ago in the middle of farmland. Today, the district is completely built up, and this boundary cuts several buildings in the middle.
"The Tremblay racecourse, installed a few years ago, has established a continuous fence that completely separates a district populated by several hundred inhabitants from the rest of Champigny. As a result, these inhabitants, thus pushed towards Joinville, where they use the train station, the post office... and the schools, are asking to be part of the latter commune.
"If they could obtain the support of the Champigny municipal council, the question would be resolved and they would have full satisfaction.
"In the meantime, the Joinville municipal council considers that it does not have the right to incur large expenses for school construction, while the corresponding revenue is collected by another commune. »

Meanwhile, the kids from Champigny, who are no longer wanted in Polangis, are on strike from school… As well, the problem is not local. It is not just municipalities that are fighting, it is also simple neighborhoods.

In Pierrefitte, the “group” in the center, Place de l’Église, receives children from everywhere from Stains, Montmagny, Sarcelles. Its classes are extremely full. Two playgrounds had to be converted. Meanwhile, with the same premises and roughly the same staff, the “group” on Avenue de Saint-Denis is short of schoolchildren.

What to do? The mayor of Pierrefitte has posted on the walls that no student, old or new, will be admitted to his schools without a new registration form issued by the town hall. The measure is drastic. But it is, it seems, irregular, since, when a child is registered on the school register, he is exempt from any other formality…

And then, there is the right recognized to the father of the family to choose the school where he pleases to send his children… We see that the question is not the simplest. It is obvious that, in the Seine and in Seine-et-Oise, the current limitation of municipalities and districts no longer corresponds to anything.

The Paris region has become an administrative monster. But who will take the initiative to give it a new face?