An Bord Pleanala rejects appeal over €31,500 Laois vacant site levy

An Bord Pleanala has upheld Laois County Council’s imposition of a vacant site levy of over €31,500 on a site valued at €150,000. 

The .17 hectare site, which is located at Crossneen, Springhill Road, Graiguecullen to the east of the access road to Meadows Way in Graiguecullen, was placed on the council’s Vacant Sites Register in 2019.

Bruce and Barbara Fennell appealed the council’s levy to An Bord Pleanala. 

They were given notice of the council’s intention to place the site on the Vacant Sites Register on March 13, 2018. The site was then placed on the register on June 10, 2019. 

According to an An Bord Pleanala Inspector’s report on the site, planning permission had been granted for residential development in January 2005. Those plans were altered in 2007 and then in 2012 they were extended by five years.    

A valuation of the site at €150,000 was issued by Laois County Council on August 5, 2021.The determination of market value was then appealed to the Valuation Tribunal. A Valuation Tribunal judgement on March 9, 2023  dismissed the appeal and confirmed the value of the land at €150,000.

Laois County Council imposed a 7% levy equating to €10,500 for each year in 2020, 2021 and 2022. The levy was appealed to An Bord Pleanala by Bruce Fennell and Barbara Fennell. 

Among their arguments against the inclusion of the site on the Vacant Site Register was the fact that it had been in agricultural use. They said the site was in agricultural use during the relevant years and they provided photographs demonstrating this from November 2019,  April 2020, April 2021 and March 2022. 

An Inspectors report stated that: “The appellants dispute that the site continued to be vacant at the time of appeal as it was in agricultural use…. however the ploughing of a field need not necessarily demonstrate that it was in agricultural use. Considering the size area, though combined with lands to the east, this is not a significant landholding for the purposes of tillage farming etc.”  

An Bord Pleanala found in favour of Laois County Council and rejected the appeal. 

“The Board considered that the site was a vacant site on the 1st day of January 2022, and that the amount of the levy has been correctly calculated at 7% of the site value in 2022, confirmed by the Valuation Tribunal to be €150,000 (one hundred and fifty thousand euros). The Board is satisfied there has been no change in the ownership of the site during the period concerned, that is, 2022, and the demand for payment of the vacant site levy of €10,500 (ten thousand five hundred euros) under Section 15 of the Urban Regeneration and Housing Act 2015 is, therefore, confirmed,” An Bord Pleanala stated in their order. 

The same order was made for 2021 and 2020 meaning the landowners are now liable for a vacant site levy for the three years which amounts to €31,500.