The amount of money being spent on planning enforcement by Castlebar Town Council was questioned at the annual budget meeting of the local authority this week.
Independent councillor Michael Kilcoyne who has raised the issue of planning enforcement on a number of previous occasions. “We have budgeted €139,738 for planning enforcement, that’s just about one third of the budget that Mayo County Council has budgeted for the whole county for the year,” Cllr Kilcoyne told the meeting. “I’m somewhat concerned that we have budgeted this amount of money for this issue and we don’t see results. I’ve a list here of enforcement cases, the first one on it is nine years old and still not resolved and the next one is five years old. Have we recovered money from these people, have we taken many cases against people?”
Town manager Seamus Granahan, responding to Cllr Kilcoyne, said: “I’m aware there are a number of issues to be dealt with which we will. I know of a number of times that local authorities have taken cases against developers in other areas and won and got judgment for costs against the developer, but the developer had no money and the council were left having to pay for these costs. Court costs are huge, but we have picked up our performance in this area and we are looking to improve our efficiency in it all the time.”
