Foxford saga

Hope House saga set for week long hearing

THE community of Foxford will have to wait until November to learn how the Circuit Court will rule on a land title dispute over part of Hope House Addiction Treatment Centre.
After hearing the ‘extremely complex’ evidence in the case in Swinford Courthouse last Thursday, Judge Donagh McDonagh concluded that a special sitting of the court spanning a possible four days will be needed and he adjourned the matter for hearing until November. The matter has caused much consternation in the town of Foxford over the last number of months and interest in the case was reflected by the large crowd which packed the courthouse last Thursday.
Mr Paul Flannery, BL, for Foxford Social & Community Company Limited, who took the action against the well known addiction centre, told Swinford Circuit Court last week that Hope House had incorporated the old girls’ school in Foxford into its treatment centre complex despite the fact that the plaintiff was the registered owner of the lands.
He said the first name defendant, Hope, applied to county planners for a change of use of the school house on or about June 8, 2004. He said Hope had moved into the premises and were carrying out extensive works there with the purpose of extending onto the school. Mr Flannery said that as his client was the legal owner, the plaintiff was guilty of trespassing and slander of title.
He said the arrangement by which the Sisters of Mercy running Hope House came to be associated with the old school premises was as a result of a swap of the girls school for the boys school involving a now dissolved company, Providence Community Centre Ltd.
Mr John Jordan, BL, for Hope and St Nathy’s Diocesan Trust, argued that the building was in a state of disrepair prior to works carried out by the Sisters of Charity. He said they had spent over €500,000 to put it into its present condition. He said the original deal was struck by Providence seven years before the establishment of Foxford Social & Community Company Ltd and that members of the dissolved company now have no issue with the deal struck.
Mr Frank Devaney, a director of Foxford Social & Community Company Ltd, said the company had no issue with the work Hope House carried out.
Judge Donagh McDonagh described the case as ‘extremely complex’ and said that if there was an agreement and that was carried out before Foxford Social & Community Company was formed ‘then there is a real problem’.
He said that the case justified a special sitting to span at least three days, if not four.
Judge McDonagh adjourned the case to a week-long special sitting and ordered an application be made to the Court Services to that effect. It is now thought that the case will be heard in the week beginning November 11 or, failing that, November 18.