The Legend of Catus, France

There is a legend that the medieval village of Catus, in southwest France, derives its name from a large cat that roamed the area in the early middle ages. The story goes that the cat had a lair somewhere to the north of the village and used to terrorise the villagers so much so that the local lord offered his daughter's hand in marriage and half his domain to anyone who could get rid of this menace. A young, handsome, bold and courageous knight presented himself for the challenge. He was given a magnificent horse and arms to carry out the task. When the knight approached the lair of the large cat it jumped at him and the knight thrust his lance up to the hilt in the cat's body. He returned triumphantly with his trophy to the lord's castle and claimed his prize. It is said that from this time the village was called Catus - meaning cat in Latin.

Catus in the snow....

The little medieval village of Catus in southwest France has not been spared the extreme winter weather that has hit Europe in recent weeks. On Saturday 9th January the village woke up to a beautiful snow-filled wintry scene after very heavy snowfall overnight. Such snowfall happens once every few years and lasts for just a few days - enough for the villagers to enjoy and motorists to cope with!

District heating system in Catus, France

The village of Catus where I live (pop. about 1000) decided to go ahead with the installation of a district heating system about a year ago. Basically a regional/district heating system consists of a central boiler house and a network of insulated pipes to circulate hot water to buildings in the district. Within a building a heat exchanger transfers the heat to the internal domestic supply - either the water supply for radiators only or for both radiators and domestic hot water.

A network of insulated pipes is being laid in the village(see picture) and the building of the centralised district boiler house(pictured) is also well underway. The system is projected to be operational from October 2010 and will supply all public buildings - the school, medical centre, town hall, and so on - and many householders.

Reorganisation of regional and local government in France

France currently consists of over 35,000 communes, 4,000 cantons, 100 departments and 22 regions. In an attempt to rationalise this wide array of regional and local government and cut expenditure President Sarkosy at the end of 2008 appointed an ex-Prime Minister Eduoard Balladur to head a commission to look into the matter. This commission reported early in 2009. For some background on this issue see the BBC Report and the Irish Times report. See also page 7 of The French State and its territorial challenges by Alistair Cole. This article as a whole gives a very good overview of regional and local government in France.

Most of the Balladur proposals for reorganisation at the regional and departmental levels have been scrapped or put on hold (see the above reports). However, at the communal and inter-communal levels a series of meetings have been held over the past few months to examine the rationalisation of Communités des Communes or inter-communal public corporations (EPCIs). On 20 November a public meeting in the commune of Catus, where I live, gave details of the fusion of the Communités des Communes de Catus (a grouping of 17 communes) and of the Pays de Cahors to create a larger Communauté de Communes du Grand Cahors. Some of the arguments put forward in favour of this fusion are that it will make for a better use of skills and of material resources (e.g. transport, sports facitities, etc.) without an increase in local taxation. This new larger grouping of communes is due to take effect as from the beginning of 2010. For more background (in French) on this particluar fusion see articles from La Depeche, a regional newspaper.