Residents' groups everywhere will take heart from the High Court's decision to lift the threat against Malahide Community Council, thus ending a nine-year legal odyssey for its directors.
What started with a £2,000 whipround raised to fight a controversial rezoning in the courts had reached the stage where seven local residents faced a nightmare legal bill of almost £350,000.
However, this danger has now passed with Mr Justice McCracken's decision not to accede to a liquidator's request to make an order against the directors.
The case illustrates the perils of taking legal action, even when you feel your case is strong and justified. The rezoning, proposed originally by the former Fianna Fáil TD, Mr G.V.Wright was fiercely contested. The developer, Mr Gerry Gannon, offered £600,000 in cash as well as playing facilities to local sports clubs in return for their support. This generated 3,000 representations in favour of the rezoning, but there were 5,000 against.
After county councillors confirmed the rezoning in September 1993 by 33 votes to 31, residents challenged the decision in the courts. They won their ex parte application, then won resoundingly in the High Court. It decided that the council did not follow its own procedures and ruled that the land at Robswall should be returned to its original green belt status.
However, the Supreme Court reversed the decision and gave the go-ahead for building on the land. All along, the community council's lawyers had expressed optimism about its chances; instead, the seven directors found themselves pursued for costs by the developers at Robswall and Fingal County Council.
The council went into liquidation, and its community activities, such as meals on wheels, wheelchair access schemes and the Tidy Towns contest, were interrupted.
One of the directors celebrating the court's decision last night was Mr Maurice Ahern, a Malahide resident and elder brother of the Taoiseach. "I'm pleased with this outcome because, after all, we were doing it for ourselves, but for the wider community," he said.
Mr Ahern accused the developers of being "vindictive" for pursuing the community council for costs of £221,000. Fingal County Council was seeking £114,000.
Another director, Mr Gerry Duggan, suggested that yesterday's proceedings were taken by "people who want to suppress bodies like our own".
"Events in planning in Dublin have shown we had very good cause to be concerned about the original rezoning decision," he said and pointed out that the court had supported limited companies as "the right kind of vehicle" for residents' groups taking such action.
Yesterday's verdict represents a pyrrhic victory for Malahide Community Council. After the rezoning in 1993, the developers obtained planning permission to build houses on the land, and this was upheld on appeal by An Bord Pleanála.
