Labour Councillors welcome spending on social housing rather than debt repayments
The allocation of €4.15 million to Louth County Council due to the repayment of land loans legacy debt by the Department of Housing is good news and could well be a game changer for the county and has been welcomed by Labour councillors Pio Smith and Mayor of Drogheda, Michelle Hall.
“This land loan legacy debt has been a huge burden to Louth County Council, not just financially but it has also inhibited the development of social housing in Drogheda” Cllr Smith explained.
“Currently the social housing waiting list is up to 13 years in Drogheda but with new lands being developed in the Northern Environs through Public Private Partnership, we in the Labour Party hope that the housing stock will be delivered in a timely manner” he added.
Cllr Hall said that many of the representations they have raised as councillors over the years, such as disabled grants, completing housing estates to a high standard and purchasing vacant and derelict property will now start to be addressed.
“It’s not often that you get additional funding outside of the budget process and we’d like to thank Chief Executive Joan Martin for the considered allocations to the spending proposal which passed unanimously on Monday.”
Councillors in Co. Louth approved the additional spending proposals at the February Louth County Council meeting. €1.25 million will be spent on match funding for disabled grants to private and social housing; restoring vacant social housing properties and on the maintenance and emergency replacement of boilers.
€2.9 million from the Revenue Account will be spent over a variety of projects including €850,000 to address housing estates that need to be brought up to standard for Taking In Charge; €250,000 for electrification of the council vehicles; €500,00 to increase the number of staff in operations, landscaping and housing: €1 million to purchase derelict and vacant properties and €50,000 additional funding for Tidy Towns groups to improve their areas.
