FRANCE | LAURENCE JÉGOUZO 183 have seemed opportune in certain cases. Many community tourist offices have thus been created on a voluntary basis. Since the adoption of the MAPTAM and NOTRe Laws, this evolution has been reinforced. Indeed, since 1 January 2017, all categories of grouping of municipalities35 have had the compulsory competence “promotion of tourism, including the creation of tourist offices”36. With this reform, the government wanted to improve the coordination of tourism promotion actions and pool resources in order to make financial savings. However, the initial objective of substituting a single community tourist office was partly abandoned by the legislator37. As the law currently stands, the coexistence of several tourist offices on the same intermunicipal or even communal territory remains possible in several cases. Firstly, if several protected territorial brands coexist on the territory of the same municipality or group of municipalities, the municipality may create a tourist office for each of the sites that have such a brand38. In the absence of textual precision, uncertainties remain as to the interpretation to be given to the notion of protected territorial mark. The government has specified that the tourist site must be protected by a trademark registered with the National Institute of Industrial Property39. However, this condition is not included in the Tourism Code. Secondly, urban communities, metropolises and the metropolis of Lyon are authorised to create one or more tourist offices on all or part of their territory40 . Thirdly, communities of communes and communities of agglomerations that include classified tourist resorts were able to decide, before 30 September 2016, to keep their existing tourist offices while attaching them to the inter-communality41. In these three cases, the management of the office is inter-communal42. In addition, the Montagne Law of 28 December 2016 authorised the communes that are members of a community of communes43 or a community 35 Community of communes, community of agglomerations, urban community, metropolis. The metropolis of Lyon, which is a territorial authority with special status, also has the competence of “promoting tourism, including the creation of tourist offices”. 36 C. tourisme, art. L. 134-1. 37 A. Fuchs-Cessot, “Offices de tourisme : les lois MAPTAM, NOTRe et Montagne accouchent d’une souris!”, AJDA, Feb. 2017. 38 C. tourisme, art. L. 133-1, al. 2. 39 QE Sénat no. 20171 de J.P. Grand, JO, 18 févr. 2016, p. 659. 40 C. tourisme, art. L. 134-1-1. 41 C. tourisme, art. L. 134-2. 42 QE AN no. 89574 de Y. Foulon, JO, 22 nov. 2016, p. 9626. 43 Code général des collectivités territoriales, art. L. 5214-16.
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