Haute-Goulaine: convicted chief kept on, skewed tender and vanishing social housing as auditors savage the town hall

Some regional audit reports are best skimmed between two depreciation tables. Then there is the one on Haute-Goulaine, a commune of 5,992 inhabitants in the Nantes wine country, Loire-Atlantique. Deliberated on 17 June 2026 by the Pays de la Loire Regional Chamber of Accounts (CRC) and made public in mid-September, it examines the commune's management since 2019. The diagnosis fits in a few words: failing governance and “significant irregularities” in public procurement.

The period covers the end of Marcelle Chapeau's term (until 2020) and that of Fabrice Cuchot (2020 to March 2026). Since 21 March 2026, the mayor's chair has belonged to Anne-Sophie Gstach-Morand, who therefore inherits the bill. An essential caveat: a regional chamber of accounts issues management findings, not criminal convictions. No elected official is being tried or convicted of anything here.

A chief executive with a well-stocked record

The most startling passage concerns the directeur général des services (DGS), the town hall's most senior civil servant, whom the press does not name. According to the CRC, as reported by Breizh-info, Actu44 and Le Courrier des stratèges, he has two final criminal convictions. In February 2023: a six-month suspended sentence, a €5,000 fine and a five-year ban on acting as a treasurer, for breach of trust at an association. In July 2023: a €5,000 fine and five years' ineligibility for breach of trust and forgery, relating to more than €34,000 of personal purchases paid with a work card while he was chief of staff in La Roche-sur-Yon, according to Actu44.

The awkward part is not the official's past but what the town hall knew about it. The chamber notes that “the mayor then in office was aware of breaches of probity concerning him from the time of recruitment”. The recruitment file reportedly contains a single interview report: that of the successful candidate. He was nonetheless kept in post, with, according to the report, an irregular recognition of seniority that affects every subsequent promotion. More broadly, the CRC points to a “total absence of any strategy to prevent breaches of probity”.

Synthetic pitch, artificial scoring

On procurement, the chamber looked at the contract for a synthetic pitch and boules ground, worth about €1 million excluding VAT and awarded in late 2024. Its finding: the bid analysis was “skewed in favour of the winning bidder”, which had come second on price. Loss estimated by the CRC: €34,000. An artificial pitch, and competition to match.

School dinners fared no better. The caterer was supposed to meet the Egalim law (50% sustainable and quality products); the commune hovered around 40–42%. The contract provided for penalties, roughly €48,000 over three years. They were never applied. As for the nursery contract, the CRC flags a lopsided Covid amendment (€57,453 of services not delivered), an unjustified eight-month extension and a 2022 re-tender not published in the Official Journal of the EU despite exceeding the thresholds. Outcome: a single bidder, the incumbent.

Social housing: the town centre melts in the sun

The heaviest file is the town-centre development concession. Initially set at €8.3 million, it reached €11.2 million over five amendments — +34%. The CRC deems amendments 3 and 4 irregular: public contributions rose by 23% (+€1.7M) and the developer's fee by 12%, while its obligation to build social housing shrank by 44%. The commune signed off despite its own legal adviser warning in February 2021 that the changes were substantial and threatened the contract's validity.

The context makes it all the tastier. Haute-Goulaine is a “carencée” commune under the SRU law, i.e. formally in default: at the end of 2016 it had only 8.78% social housing against a legal target of 25%. Yet, the chamber notes, the commune persuaded the prefect to lift that default status in late 2023 on the basis of “erroneous information”. And, per the report, not a single social home was built in 2023.

Payroll and flattering accounts

Staff management did not escape scrutiny. Between 2019 and 2024 the payroll jumped by 52%, from €1.75M to €2.66M, driven by a 22% rise in full-time-equivalent staff and a 25% rise in average cost per employee. The CRC cites irregular hiring without council resolutions creating permanent posts, and poorly controlled overtime. It also flags irregular reimbursement of councillors' expenses (€1,688 of unauthorised spending in 2022–2024) and municipal vehicles with no logbook.

Financially, debt did fall by 37%. But the stated savings are said to be artificially inflated: around €200,000 a year of public contributions was wrongly booked as investment. In all, the chamber issues nine recommendations, including transparency on councillors' allowances, regularising the social welfare centre's (CCAS) accounts, automated time-tracking and administrative corrections concerning the DGS.

And what does the town hall say?

None of the press reports consulted carries any response from the former mayor or the new municipal team. Final observation reports are normally published together with the replies of the officials concerned. Once more: a CRC does not deliver criminal judgments, it observes and recommends; to our knowledge, the management failings described have led to no prosecution of the elected officials, who are presumed innocent of any offence.

Magouilles & Compagnie verdict

Magouille or calomnie? A chamber of accounts is not a court, and nobody here has been convicted over the running of the town. But between a steered tender, forgotten penalties, vanishing social housing and a default status lifted on bad information, the picture is crowded. Holding verdict: criminal record supplied, top job retained: in Haute-Goulaine, even CVs get recycled.