diff --git a/roles/badges-backend/files/patched-fedmsg-hub b/roles/badges-backend/files/patched-fedmsg-hub
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..aaa8594bfb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/roles/badges-backend/files/patched-fedmsg-hub
@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+#!/usr/bin/python
+# This file is managed by ansible.
+#
+# Its like "permanent hotfix" so that the fedmsg-hub loads
+# the forward-compat sqlalchemy.
+#
+
+__requires__ = ['fedmsg', "sqlalchemy>=0.7"]
+import sys
+from pkg_resources import load_entry_point
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    sys.exit(
+        load_entry_point('fedmsg', 'console_scripts', 'fedmsg-hub')()
+    )
+
diff --git a/roles/badges-backend/tasks/main.yml b/roles/badges-backend/tasks/main.yml
index 77b5a6eb17..c079a5e99c 100644
--- a/roles/badges-backend/tasks/main.yml
+++ b/roles/badges-backend/tasks/main.yml
@@ -30,6 +30,18 @@
   - config
   - badges
 
+# Here I'm "permanently" hotfixing the fedmsg-hub
+# It needs to load the forward-compat sqlalchemy0.7 package from the get-go.
+- name: copy over patched fedmsg-hub
+  template: >
+    src=patched-fedmsg-hub dest=/usr/bin/fedmsg-hub
+    owner=root group=root mode=0755
+  tags:
+  - patches
+  - hotfix
+  notify:
+  - restart fedmsg-hub
+
 - name: copy over all our badge definitions
   copy: >
     src=$item