Council will not recoup €600k from sale or letting of Clondalkin property

Council will not recoup €600k from sale or letting of Clondalkin property

By Maurice Garvey

DESPITE South Dublin County Council spending over €600k on a single Clondalkin home – the local authority say it will not recoup costs from a sale or letting as previously planned.

The St Patrick’s Road property, was branded a “waste of taxpayer money” by local councillors earlier this year, after money was spent on construction costs, building a wall, and a CPO (compulsory purchase order) at an adjoining parcel of land.

st patricks Rd clondalkin 29 december 2016

The house was constructed by SDCC in 2006, and placed on the market.

However, the council encountered difficulties in the sale or letting of the house, due to a disputed strip of land which forms part of the side garden to the property – a former public pathway which remained registered in the ownership of the original developers of the estate.

Unsuccessful attempts were made to acquire the strip of land, and the council was left with “no option but to CPO the land in 2013.

A settlement was reached in December 2015 and the land acquired by the council in March of this year.

In May, the council said they hoped to “be in a position to recoup some of the cost from the future sale/letting of the house.”

However that position changed at the recent Clondalkin area committee meeting, with the council citing issues such as the “housing crisis” and “reality that the property would not achieve the financial return originally envisaged.”

Councillors had asked the council to honour an agreement with local residents that the property be sold and ring-fenced to purchase two properties for families on the housing list.

The council said it was “not be possible to ringfence income from a sale of the property to finance alternate social homes.”

They also said a remaining deficit from a sale or letting would have to be funded from other income sources.

Following discussions between senior management and the housing department, the home is likely to be allocated to a family “on the basis of medical need” rather than sold.

Final construction cost for the property was €563k with miscellaneous costs, including CPO fees, bringing total expenditure to €639k.

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