‘It seems that local democracy is dead’ - Ballina local area plan drafting blasted as ‘a charade’

THE process of drafting the Ballina Local Area Plan has been blasted as ‘a charade’ by a local representative.

Cllr Mark Duffy has claimed that councillors were beholden to the Office of the Planning Regulator regarding the amount of land they could zone for housing in their local area plan.

The county council’s Chief Executive, Kevin Kelly, compiled a report with 38 material alterations to the Ballina local area plan - 13 of which related to housing zoning.

Members of Ballina Municipal District Council rejected the 13 aforementioned material alterations, arguing that it would restrict the capacity to deliver housing locally.

A total of 44 submissions were received for the new Ballina Local Area plan, including nine from the Office of the Planning Regulator (OPR).

The OPR recommended that the new plan be adopted without material alterations for seven plots of land at Garrankeel (2), Gorteen, Laghtadwannagh, Station Road, Abbeyquarter and Laghtadwannagh.

Ten proposed material alterations in the plan related to the zoning of lands, the majority of which proposed to rezone lands to New Residential.

The OPR said that this would result in the delivery of over 2,000 housing units, well in excess of the target of 511 units over the period of the plan.

They expressed concern about ‘extensive zoning on more peripheral sites’ and the lack of detailed settlement capacity audit. The OPR also said the potential need to extend the water network would amount to an ‘inappropriate extension of services and utilities’.

Cllr Mark Duffy described the process of drafting the local area plans as ‘a charade’ given that the wishes of elected members were ‘continually rejected’.

Earlier this year, Castlebar Municipal District Council were overruled by the Minister for Housing, Darragh O’Brien, when he ordered they amend their local area plan in accordance with the OPR’s recommendations.

The OPR also objected to parts of the Westport Local Area Plan which sought to zone extra land for housing.

“It seems that local democracy is dead. We go through this and it’s not really responding to what we’re asking from as public representatives. It has happened at every stage through both the local area plan and the county development plan,” said Cllr Duffy.

Cllr Duffy said that people were emigrating due to the lack of housing in the Ballina area while those seeking to build were being restricted from doing so.

The Independent councillor said implementing the proposed material alterations would amount to ‘restricting the wishes of people who are trying to build houses and trying to solve the [housing] problem’.

The Ballina native said that only two housing estates had been built in Ballina in the last 20 years.

“The whole process is a charade, in terms of we go through and we try and express the wishes on behalf of what we see as happening in society, in communities on the ground, and ultimately our planners’ hands are then tied because of the OPR and other bureaucracy that’s above the county,” he said.

'Disgrace'

“And it restricts and puts ceilings and limits on the potential of our town, and I just think it’s a disgrace, the whole process.”

Cllr Duffy was supported by his fellow councillors, who argued that councillors should have the autonomy to zone more for housing.

Fianna Fáil councillor Annie May Reape described the rejection of the Chief Executive’s recommendations as ‘a no-brainer’.

“This morning on the radio there was a young lad… [he said] ‘All my friends are emigrating’. He didn’t say they’d no jobs. It’s because they can’t get housing,” she said.”

Cllr John O’Hara agreed, saying that people that want to build houses should be allowed to do so.

“Any house that goes up, I see it in Ardnaree, they are only up a week or five days and they are sold,” he commented.

John McMeyler, Senior Planner with Mayo County Council, said the council would have to change the local area plan within five working days and send it to the OPR.

The body, which was set up in 2019 on foot of a recommendation from the Mahon Tribunal, will then make a recommendation on the matter to the Minister for Housing.

Earlier this month, Mayo County Council passed a motion calling for the OPR to be abolished.