Thomas Gould
Ceist:231. Deputy Thomas Gould asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage the funding provided to Cork City Council for CPO, in each of the years 2020 to date. [45737/24]
Amharc ar fhreagraThursday, 7 November 2024
Ceisteanna (231)
Freagraí scríofa
In April 2023, I launched the CPO Activation Programme requiring a proactive and systematic approach by local authorities to identify vacant and derelict properties and engage with owners to bring those properties back into use. This includes the use of compulsory purchase powers by local authorities to actively use their legislative powers to acquire vacant and derelict properties, where engagement with owners has been unsuccessful. While Local authorities are empowered under a number of statutes to acquire land, by agreement or compulsorily, for the purposes of performing any of its functions, the number of derelict sites acquired within their functional area under the provisions of the Derelict Sites Act 1990 (the Act) are submitted to my Department as part of the annual return on the operation of the Act.
The number of sites specifically acquired under the Act by Cork City Council, both by way of Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) or by agreement, since 2020 is provided in the Table below.
|
Year |
No. of Derelict Sites acquired by agreement |
No. of Derelict Sites acquired compulsorily |
|
2023 |
0 |
6 |
|
2022 |
0 |
5 |
|
2021 |
0 |
0 |
|
2020 |
1 |
0 |
|
Total |
1 |
11 |
In January 2023, a third round of funding support under the Urban Regeneration Development Fund was announced. Supporting key objectives of Housing for All and Town Centre First, this round of URDF support specifically addresses long term vacancy and dereliction across URDF eligible cities and town.
This is being achieved through the provision of a €150m revolving fund for local authorities to acquire long term vacant or derelict properties. The fund will be replenished from the proceeds of sale allowing local authorities to establish a rolling programme to tackle long-term vacancy and dereliction without a requirement for borrowing and the associated financial risk.
There were three key criteria for the first round of property approvals, onto Local Authority’s Approved Programmes:
• Existing building (sites were not approved)
• Town centre zoned
• Expected to yield residential end-use
• Cork City Council were allocated €6 million under Call 3 of the URDF to address derelict and vacant properties in the city, with €1,200,000 (20%) in pre-funding issued to the Council to encourage early activity under the programme. The Council have 59 properties on their approved programme, 3 of which have been acquired by compulsory purchase and the process to purchase by CPO has commenced on a further 2 properties.