Dear Grimaudoises, Dear Grimaudois,

Dear residents of Port Grimaud,

We enter gradually entering an important stage for the municipality, with the deadline in 2025 of the first two public service delegations of the port management in Port Grimaud. The next years will be decisive for Grimaud and for the residents of Port Grimaud. This deadline must be prepared with meticulousness by the Municipality in its role of delegator and by the delegates who must meet their contractual obligations. The public service delegation responds to very strict administrative rules that no one can free themselves from, either in their execution or in their evaluation. I know that this stage is worrying, because Port Grimaud since the very beginning has never known a different mode of operation than the one applied in the three concessions.

It is for this reason that I want all transparency to be provided in the files under study as well as on the questions and the main concerns of residents. Managing the end of current port concessions is a complex file with multiple challenges, which requires clarity of information, pedagogy, and intellectual honesty.

To prepare for 2025, and as is customary, the town commissioned a technical and financial audit report from the concessionaires.

Following the presentation of the conclusions of the audit report to the representatives of the concessionaires on December 11, 2020, a disinformation campaign seems to have been set up within Port-Grimaud, with the sole aim: the desire to create a feeling of panic in the minds of residents, and thereby hamper the work of the municipality in its role as delegator. The municipality has always wanted to work hand in hand with the public service delegated entities when other actors wish to orchestrate the systematic rejection of any initiative by the Collectivity within the port entity.

It therefore seems useful to me to draw up a "situation report" recalling the evolution of two major subjects: that of the management of the silting up of the outer harbor and its memorandum of understanding; that of the conclusions of the audit report (theses notes will be soon available in English).

I hope that this information will reassure you and that they will not be the starting point of a new misinformation campaign the only result of which is to damage the image of Port Grimaud localy and worldwilde. I appreciatetoo highly Port Grimaud, which is why I cannot let its image tarnish all the time. Our lakeside city is shinning all over the world, it is up to all of us to be responsible for continuing to make it shine for as long as possible.

Alain BENEDETTO

Mayor of Grimaud