Ahead of the 2026 municipal elections, Le Monde features portraits of municipal agents. Aliette Caron, in Rouen's civil registry, assists users with complex administrative procedures. Kevin Le Derff, a municipal police officer in Marseille, educates youth on the risks of nitrous oxide following a military career.
Published on February 21, 2026, in Le Monde, the portraits highlight the daily lives of municipal agents in France ahead of the 2026 municipal elections.
In Rouen, Aliette Caron, 53, earns 1,870 euros net monthly in the civil registry service. On Wednesday, February 4, in the waiting room of the former monks' dormitory, she receives users at counter number 4. Her desk includes a screen, stapler, fingerprint reader, and soda can. She assists Roselyne with a passport renewal: checking details on France Titres, explaining fields to fill, taking fingerprints. “It’s you!”, she announces. The process takes ten minutes, and she advises photographing the deposit ticket.
Eleven front office counters out of fourteen are open. In the back office, ten agents process files and answer phones amid the shredder's noise. The records room, with archives since 1924, provides a quiet space for lunch breaks.
In Marseille, Kevin Le Derff, 39, receives 2,400 euros net monthly as a municipal police officer in the operational prevention service. In the morning, at the 3rd arrondissement urban supervision center, he trains a dozen teenagers from the Estaque professional high school on the dangers of nitrous oxide, a laughing gas popular on Snapchat. Standing 1.87 meters tall, with a shaved head and scorpion tattoo, he uses a PowerPoint and holds up customized canisters, such as one in Marseille colors or GTA-themed. “I’m like you under my uniform, I made mistakes too,” he says to engage the students.
A former Foreign Legionnaire for twenty years, deployed to Afghanistan, Mali, and the Central African Republic, he left the public tranquility brigade, tired of violent attitudes. He now prefers to serve differently in the northern neighborhoods.
These accounts underscore the administrative and prevention challenges in municipal services.
