This article is from page 14 of the 2007-12-18 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 14 JPG
CLARE county councillors have called for strict regulations prevent- ing county planners from using their personal opinions or “whims” to de- cide the planning issues to be intro- duced.
As part of a motion put forward at last night’s planning-dominated meeting of Clare County Council, Cllr Michael Kelly (FF) called for set criteria to be followed in relation to one-off housing in the county.
“Some planners have decided that a house should be to their own de- sire and not to the desire of the peo- ple who live in the house. Planners come and planners go and they make different decisions. But people can get stuck with houses that they don’t want,’ said Cllr Kelly.
“Planning permission for houses in rural areas has gotten to be a very complicated process. There are so many different conditions that a per- son wishing to build a house must go through and all of these are at a cost to the person themselves.
“I am here to raise this issue and will continue to raise the issue as
long as I am here. We don’t want ag- gravation. We just want to put for- ward this issue.”
Seconding the motion, Cllr PJ Kelly
(FF) called for clarity to be brought into the planning system relating to one-off housing.
“Different planners have different
emphases. I’d even go as far as to say whims. This whole idea of having one rule for Mick and one rule for Pat cannot carry on,’ said Cllr Kelly.
“All we are asking for is an agreed methodology and agreed conditions. We need to get some sort of clarity to this situation. This is as much for the planners’ benefit as for our own.”
Meanwhile, in a separate motion put forward by Cllr Tom Prenderville (FF), it was called for a distinct sec- tion of the County Development Plan to be set up to focus on the develop- ment of rural development.
“I have noticed in our policy that we pay an awful lot of attention to the cuckoo and the corncrake and historical buildings but not an awful lot of attention to people,” said Cllr Prenderville.
“There is a glaring need to put in place a development strategy in County Clare. We need to show a positive approach towards rural de- velopment and tackle it as a separate and very important issue.”