Council to make €5 million funding application for Birr Courthouse
Council officials are preparing an application to the government's Regional Rural Development Fund
A MAJOR funding application worth nearly €5 million is being prepared by the County Council for Birr's early 19th century Courthouse.
As well as being an important building, the Courthouse stands in a prominent, very visible position on the main road running through Birr.
The local community group Birr 20:20 Vision, since its foundation in 2014, in the wake of the abolition of Town Councils, has made the rehabilitation of the Courthouse one of its priorities.
“Progress on the building has been gradual but steady,” Gary Hoctor, Chairperson of Birr 20:20, told The Midland Tribune. “Initial work to establish which state agency held responsibility took considerable time. Once that was resolved, Offaly County Council moved to take the building into its portfolio and subsequently secured grants totalling almost €500,000 to weatherproof the structure. Now, Council officials are preparing an application to the government's Regional Rural Development Fund seeking close to €5 million to bring the building to a standard appropriate to a heritage structure in the 21st century — one that is both physically sound and energy-efficient.”
Gary said Birr 20:20 are calling upon residents, businesses, and community organisations across the town to “get involved before the end of June.”
Some years ago, Birr 20:20, with support from Offaly Local Development Company, developed a proposal for the building to serve as an arts hub and community resource for the wider Municipal District. A Scoping Report for what became known as the Creative Court was prepared by Louise Browne and Associates and launched in 2019 by Anna-Marie Delaney, then Chief Executive of Offaly County Council. That report remains the foundation on which all further planning has been built.
“The vision that has emerged since,” Gary pointed out, “is one that places the Courthouse within a wider cluster of cultural and community buildings. Together with Birr Theatre and Arts Centre, St. Brendan's Church of Ireland, and St. Brendan's Hall, a restored Courthouse could anchor a coherent creative and cultural quarter for the town — one that reflects both the deep roots of Birr's artistic and heritage traditions and the demands of contemporary community life.
“Birr already has considerable heritage in this regard. The town centre — Emmet Square, O'Connell Street, Main Street, Market Square, Oxmantown Mall, the Green and John's Place — is among the most intact historic streetscapes in the Irish Midlands. That architectural heritage has long been matched by an equally sustained tradition across drama, music, film, literature, and the visual arts, as evidenced year after year across five festivals including Vintage Week. More recently, that heritage thread has extended into science and technology through the Birr Scientific and Heritage Foundation Science Centre and the newly established Science Festival (STEAM).”
When fully renovated, it's intended that the Courthouse will provide additional meeting rooms available to community groups and voluntary organisations; studio spaces for practising artists; rehearsal space for drama, vocal, and instrumental work; a home for emerging animation activity; smaller office spaces suitable for focused working groups or sole traders; spaces to support both established and new social activities.
“The underlying argument,” continued the Chair, “made plainly in the proposal documents, is that such a building would ensure that human creativity is not overwhelmed by the artificial — a concern the project's supporters regard as one of the defining issues of the current era. The restored Courthouse is framed not merely as a building project but as infrastructure for community resilience."
Offaly County Council will formally submit the application to the Regional Rural Development Fund at the end of July. In the meantime, organisers are asking anyone who can see a use for the space — whether that is a community group in need of a meeting room, a small working group looking for a focused workspace, a sole trader or creative whose work would benefit from proximity to others in similar fields — to put that interest in writing.
Letters of support endorsing the restoration should be addressed to Gary Hoctor, Chairperson of Birr 20:20 Vision, and sent to him at [email protected] to arrive no later than the end of June.
“The Courthouse has waited a long time,” commented Gary. “The people working to restore it are asking the community to help make the case that the wait has been worth it. Applications of this scale are almost always assessed competitively, and a strong volume of letters of support from community groups, organisations, and individuals substantially strengthens any such bid.”