Tipperary Council to convene third special meeting about housing crisis in two years

A special meeting of Tipperary County Council is to be convened in the next few weeks to discuss measures to tackle the county’s ongoing housing crisis.

It will be the third special meeting of the local authority’s 40 elected members in the past two years to focus solely on how to address the shortage of housing.

Councillors sought the special housing summit at the County Council’s September meeting in Clonmel last week.

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Cathaoirleach Cllr Declan Burgess got the ball rolling by proposing a special meeting to discuss accelerating the county’s affordable housing programme to address the housing needs of the “squeezed” middle income earners. He proposed the meeting include presentations from industry experts.

But other councillors called for the meeting to the broadened to cover all housing issues facing the Council.

Nenagh Independent Cllr Seamus Morris said the special meeting should also involve the Council’s planning officials because more housing couldn’t be delivered in the county without more wastewater infrastructure.

Newcastle Independent Cllr Máirín McGrath said the Council was very rarely getting people with disabilities off the social housing applicants’ list because of a lack of adapted housing to suit their needs.

Fine Gael Cllr Mary Hanna Hourigan from Cappawhite said the housing shortage was the most serious issue facing the Council and urged that special meeting be convened as soon as possible.

Carrick-on-Suir Sinn Féin Cllr David Dunne cited delays of months in re-allocating vacant council homes to new tenants as an issue.

Meanwhile Cashel Independent Cllr Liam Browne said there were constituents coming to him asking how they were expected to afford to to buy a house at current prices. Houses in one new estate in Cashel were selling at €355,000.

He also highlighted how he was notified of four cases of tenants in private rented accommodation receiving notices to quit in one housing estate in Cashel.

Clonmel Workers & Unemployment Action Group Cllr Pat English said a special meeting on housing was badly needed.

He told the meeting the Council was playing catch up after nearly 20 years of not building social housing and there were still 3,500 applicants on the Council's housing list.

And he pointed out people are paying between €1,400 and €1,600 per month to rent a house at the moment.

Council's Response

The Council’s Director of Housing Jonathan Cooney responded that the Council will have built 1,100 new social houses over the lifetime of the 2022 to 2026 Housing for All plan whereas the Department of Housing’s target was 887 units.

The Council was also re-allocating 145 void social housing units to new tenants annually and in the past 18 months had reduced the proportion of vacant houses in its stock from 4.5% in 2019/2020 to 1.8%.

Mr Cooney explained it can take a number of months to re-let a council home that becomes vacant. In cases where a tenant die, the Council has to be sensitive to their family’s needs. A house becoming vacant was an opportunity to upgrade it and this delayed its re-letting, he explained.

Mr Cooney also said the Council had housed 55 people with disabilities in the county so far this year and acquired 46 private houses in cases where HAP and RAS recipients received notices to quit and sale was agreed for 25 more homes.

He added that the Council was notified of 72 cases of social housing tenants receiving notices to quit so far this year compared to 144 cases over the same period last year.

In relation to the special meeting, Council CEO Sinead Carr advised councillors to focus on a number of key topics rather than trying to cover housing issues right across the board, which she warned would result in little being achieved.

She suggested councillors focus on the delivery of affordable housing and proposed it would be worthwhile to bring in a speaker from the Construction Industry Federation to discuss issues like banking finance and access to mortgages.

She also proposed the meeting include updates on the time frame for delivery of social housing schemes and wastewater infrastructure and an update on how the Council is dealing with people issued with notices to quit from private rental properties and people who become homeless.

Ms Carr said the Council could come up with a series of actions at the special meeting to deal with these housing issues.