France enacts mountain law easing school thresholds and class consultation

The Loi n° 2026-797 du 18 août 2026 pour une montagne vivante et souveraine was promulgated and published in the Journal officiel de la République française n° 0192 of 19 August 2026. The text, which adapts school staffing thresholds to mountain zones and strengthens consultation on class openings and closures, was validated by the Conseil constitutionnel in its decision n° 2026-912 DC of 14 August 2026, rendered public the same day.

The law was referred to the Conseil constitutionnel on 23 July 2026 by more than seventy deputies of the La France insoumise and Les Écologistes groups, who contested the place of article 10 and the constitutionality of articles 5, 7 and 8. The Council, sitting on 12 August 2026 under its President Richard Ferrand, declared all contested provisions conform to the Constitution, rejecting the grievances based on the Charte de l’environnement and on article 45 of the Constitution.

School thresholds adapted to mountain zones

Article 1 inserts a new article L. 211-1-1 into the code de l’éducation, obliging the State to inform territorial collectivities each year of projected enrolment variations in primary education and their possible consequences on class openings and closures over a three-to-five-year horizon. Academic directors must now engage in consultation with the competent collectivities before the departmental education councils meet.

Article 2 extends the same mechanism to secondary education and requires that class-opening and closure decisions take account of teaching conditions, distance, local demographic trends and development projects. The thresholds for opening and closing classes are adapted to the specificities of mountain schools, taking into account isolation, access conditions and school transport times.

Health, water and local governance

The law also strengthens access to care in mountain zones: the regional health project must guarantee access to pharmacy and general-medicine services, emergency and psychiatric emergency structures, intensive care and maternity within reasonable times, and provide for air emergency transport in very isolated zones. A specific mountain commission is created within inter-municipal cooperation bodies that include at least one mountain commune.

• State action in mountain zones now includes a water-storage policy, excluding pumping from inertial aquifers.
• The master plan for electric-vehicle charging infrastructure must ensure balanced coverage in mountain territories, favouring rapid charging.
• The law supports the territorial network of local slaughterhouses and veterinary services, and promotes certification marks and bio-sourced materials for mountain forestry.

Urbanism and financing

Articles 7 and 8 relax the principle of urbanisation continuity in mountain zones, integrating physical breaks such as roads, watercourses and embankments, and allow derogations from coastal-protection rules in certain sectors of mountain communes bordering large inland water bodies. Article 10 postpones from 2027 to 2030 the entry into force of the ban on urbanisation extension in communes of the collectivité de Corse not covered by a local urban plan.

The cost of the law for the State and for territorial collectivities is offset by the creation of an additional tax on tobacco products and by an increase in the global operating grant. The law will be executed as a law of the State.

For the communes and schools of the French mountains, the text translates into more flexible staffing thresholds and a stronger voice for local collectivities in decisions on class openings and closures, while the validated urbanism provisions aim to reduce legal uncertainty for construction projects in these territories.

Source: Journal officiel de la République française, n° 0192 of 19 August 2026 (official reference: Loi n° 2026-797 du 18 août 2026, NOR TECX2612763L; Décision n° 2026-912 DC du 14 août 2026, NOR CSCL2622256S).