Large numbers of motions seeking planning permission for rural housing will continue to come before Kerry County Council until planning officials take a less rigid approach to one-off housing in rural areas, councillors said yesterday. Anne Lucey reports.
Kerry county councillors say they are coming under "savage pressure" from constituents to secure planning.
Regular monthly meetings are dominated by "Section 140s". These are motions directing the county manager to grant permission for developments, and this is despite several special meetings to try to sort out the impasse.
This reserved function of councillors under the local government Acts was designed to deal with exceptional planning matters, not the current numbers, and planners in Kerry have had to adopt emergency procedures to cope with the work involved in preparing reports for the motions.
"I would be the first to admit, and I have stated it previously, a section 140 is not a professional way to do our business. But it's the only option we have," Fianna Fáil councillor Mr Michael Cahill said.
Living on Rossbeigh strand, where he runs a pub and restaurant, Mr Cahill is on the cutting edge of the planning battle in the scenic, tourist-dependent Ring of Kerry Killorglin electoral area which takes in mid-Kerry and the coastal towns of Castlecove and Sneem and on to Kenmare.
He was the lead proposer (Section 140s must be signed by three councillors) in a quarter of the 27 planning motions at Monday's council meeting, and his name figured in most.
"Councillors are coming under savage pressure. You can't twist or turn with planning. I have over 100 planning files right now." He had some sympathy with the planners who were under-staffed and under equal pressure - but they were servants of the public too and should understand the genuine need, he said.
Last Monday, the case of Mr William Murphy of Direenamanagh, Glencar, was adjourned, to the huge frustration of Mr Murphy who was present in the council chamber.
"He has 240 acres and he can't get planning," said Mr Cahill. "The house is for himself. He has been trying to get permission for two-and-a-half years and has spent €20,000. The house he is living in now has no hot water, no shower. This is his third application."
The Glencar valley - an undulating valley of trees, mountains and lakes straight out of the scenery of The Lord of the Rings - has now only 130 houses where it once had 260, Mr Cahill said. "In the last five years, I can count on one hand the number of planning permissions granted in Glencar."
Fianna Fáil councillor Mr Brian O'Leary in the Killarney electoral area - where sites in the rural area "cannot be got for €70,000" - regularly proposes a small number of Section 140s. An auctioneer, he says his motions are for genuine family and young couple cases only and he sometimes refuses to use Section 140.
"I have absolutely no doubt in my mind planners are taking a more rigid view." Until there was a specific directive from the Department of the Environment and Local Government to planners to take a less rigid approach, he could not see any reduction in the planning motions at meetings.
Mr Michael Healy-Rae, an Independent councillor, is an outspoken advocate of freeing up planning in all areas in Kerry. The new rural guidelines published by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Cullen, last week, "are more stringent than our own county development plan," he said.
"While there might be counties that might benefit from the Minister's guidelines, Kerry will not."
In Kenmare, Fine Gael councillor and auctioneer Mr Michael Connor-Scarteen can count only seven families with children going to school who are living in the heart of the town.
"People are building because mortgage rates are very reasonable. . .Townspeople want to move out into the countryside," he said.
Mr Connor-Scarteen was involved in 10 of the Section 140s this week. He said he could not see an end to the need to use them for local people until "a bit of common sense" was employed by the planners who seemed to him to be city oriented rather than rural.