The elected members of Ballina Town Council this week adopted a new antisocial behaviour policy this week, which they worked out in committee recently. The new policy, which has its foundations in a county wide policy, saw a number of different changes brought in by the Ballina councillors to address flaws and issues they thought were not covered sufficiently by the county wide document. As part of their policy there will be quarter yearly meetings between the Gardaí, the council, an the HSE to discuss items that arise. They have also included provisions that anyone who is in housing provided by another agency and are on the council’s housing list can be excluded from the list for 10 years following the issuing of an antisocial behaviour order.
Following on from the adoption of the new bye-laws a motion proposed by Cllr Johnny O’Malley was passed by the councillors en-masse calling on the Ministers for Social Welfare and Environment to ensure that rental subsidy is not paid on property that is not registered with the PRTB. That rental subsidy is not paid on a property where the intended tenant is not on the local authority housing list, and that property owners when landlord is not registered with the PRTB are prosecuted. The members all agreed at the meeting that greater emphasis needed to be put on the control of rental subsidies being given as a lot of the complaints they get about antisocial behaviour are not about tenants of the council’s houses, but rather private rented houses over which the new bye laws have no power a lot of the time.
