Council have €2.5m to purchase derelict buildings in county

Westmeath County Council said they received €2.5m in funding to buy long-term derelict buildings, and are examining the potential for such purchases “within the urban core of Athlone and Mullingar”.

The funding was mentioned in response to a motion from Cllr Liam McDaniel, who asked that the Athlone Moate Municipal District “serve a compulsory purchase order (CPO) on any derelict property in the district whose owner or owners are not compliant with, and are not paying, the derelict levy.”

The motion prompted plenty of discussion at the January meeting, as councillors spoke of how derelict buildings were blighting the streetscapes of towns and villages.

Cllr McDaniel said in his own town, Kilbeggan, he recently passed a long-derelict property on the Mullingar Road, which he has highlighted before, “and I can safely say there’s at least 10 notices on the door”.

“I am at this since 2016, going past the same house, and every year there’s another notice put in the door. I said, what are we at?

“It’s the same sites, year in and year out, and we don’t seem to be doing anything about it”.

Cllr McDaniel welcomed the response from the council, which mentioned receipt of €2.5m from the Urban Regeneration and Development Fund Compulsory Purchase Acquisition Programme.

He said that was “a good news story” but he took issue with the fact that the funding was being targeted at urban areas of Athlone and Mullingar.

“There is dereliction in Mullingar and Athlone, but both towns are thriving commercially,” said Cllr McDaniel.

“When you go to the towns outside Athlone and Mullingar, even Moate, and others, dereliction is a problem. If we continue to let dereliction prevail, our towns and villages will disappear off the map. There will be no communities there.

“If you go down the main street of Moate and Kilbeggan, there are businesses you remember from when they were thriving, and they’re now standing empty. So I’d ask that smaller towns and villages are not forgotten in this programme.”

Cllr Aengus O’Rourke said there had been “no ownership taken” of the dereliction issue in the county. He pointed out that the council had officers with responsibility for various issues, but no officer for dereliction.

“It’s a bit haphazard, how it’s managed, from the urban areas through to the rural areas. I think we need to be a bit more proactive,” said Cllr O’Rourke.

Cllr Tom Farrell agreed dereliction was an issue “in every town and village in the county, and probably in the country”.

His view was that “the law is weak” in relation to compulsory purchase orders on eyesore properties. “When it goes into the legal system it can take years for action to be taken.”

Cllr Johnnie Penrose said it was “scandalous” to see the number of vacant and derelict properties that exist, given the current shortage of housing. There are a number of grant schemes available at present to help renovate derelict properties, Cllr John Dolan pointed out. “There are plenty of carrots, but there’s probably not enough stick to make people do it,” he said.

“People are touchy about property rights, but you can’t allow someone to have a property that’s going to take down the value of everyone else’s property. There’s plenty of demand for property. If you can’t develop it yourself, put the feckin’ thing up for sale. Someone will buy it and take it on.”

Cllr Paul Hogan said the last ‘bulk’ issuing of CPOs in Athlone happened when he was mayor, and “that wasn’t today or yesterday”.

“It’s about having a scheme that incentivises people to buy into it rather than penalising people who don’t,” said Cllr Hogan.

Director of services Jackie Finney said the council work to address dereliction and that doing so required “a lot of cross-collaboration” across sections of the local authority.

She said it was often the case that the ownership of derelict buildings was “not straightforward” and that complicated taking action against them.