A Clonmel councillor wants rate payers reimbursed if projects don’t start to see progress.
Independent Niall Dennehy told a recent meeting that the work to tackle dereliction had stalled and he was disappointed to see that the person working on the regeneration scheme for the town had been redeployed.
He was told that while the council awaited news on their URDF application that officer had been appointment as an SEO in Environment in the interim.
However, Cllr. Dennehy said he has no reason to trust that the project will move forward and in that case rate and LPT increases are both unjustified.
“There as imposition of an increase on the commercial rate and indeed the local property tax we were told that was there as match funding for this initiative here in Clonmel and if that’s not the case, and there is no reason to believe that it is going to happen, if you take the public realm three and half years down the road and nothing having happened, if that’s not the case then I am arguing that those monies should be reimbursed to the rate payers and the domestic people who have paid their local property tax.”
He also went on to discuss the need for more focus to be put on restoring prominent derelict buildings in Clonmel.
Cllr. Dennehy said that the council was focusing on private vacant properties rather than the visible eyesores in Clonmel.
“I saw if you are talking 21 derelictions, if you are talking individual houses they can be that bit more difficult, I am talking about the ones that really impact on the visual aspects of the town like the Clonmel Arms, up at the likes of Kenny’s Corner and Chawkes Corner areas like that where dereliction is really evident, and it’s those jobs that really need to be pushed.”
