Wave of relief and praise as Draft Development Plan deliberations come to an end

PAUL MURPHY

In a marathon race of deliberations lasting 82 hours and 40 minutes with thousands of words spoken, maps perused, notices of motion tabled, Meath county councillors staggered to the finishing line on the draft Meath County Development Plan last Friday.

Now the finishing touches and proposed amendments will be tied up and in a few weeks the changes between the 'old plan' (2013-19) and the 'new plan' (2021-27) will be put on display to the general public.

As is normal, work on a new development plan starts two years before the existing plan is due to expire and that process was followed.

That was BC (before Covid) and no one could envisage at that stage how the pandemic would rage through the country and bring normal life as we know it virtually to a halt.

Every draft plan has a requirement to be examined and voted on by county councillors and traditionally this would have been progressed at the council chamber in Railway Street, Navan. However, Covid-19 struck and the meetings of councillors were transferred to the Solstice Theatre, albeit gatherings there were limited to 115 minutes and social distancing rules were enforced in a bid to protect councillors and council staff. There were genuine fears that a Covid infection caught by one individual could send many more into isolation.

The Level 5 lockdown put paid to any further physical meetings and the sessions on the draft plan were shifted online, a controversial move in itself when up to 13 councillors objected to dealing with the plan through the internet.

Zooming became the new normal, with officials, the councillors, and the council legal advisor working remotely from offices or homes. There was a further delay to deliberations on the draft plan when planning officials had to drop out of the process on 6th February this year in order to deal with 250 planning applications which had come into the council offices since before Christmas, some of which were time sensitive and had to be processed before the end of February.

Councillors’ meetings on the draft plan only resumed on Wednesday of last week and four days had been pencilled in for a closure on deliberations. In the event, they were able to finish at lunchtime on Friday.

Not surprisingly, one issue which dominated proceedings at the public meetings of councillors was that of one-off houses in rural areas. Officials have drawn a firm line between those who “need” to live in the countryside and those who “wish” to live there.

It may be that the Covid pandemic has created a permanent shift in work patterns, with many more people wanting to or being required to work from home.

This question of one-off houses has been a bone of contention for some years as officials endeavour to curb the growth of single dwellings in the countryside by introducing 'graigs' (small clusters of between five and seven houses as per the 2013-19 plan) and further restricting one-off houses in the draft 2021-27 plan by requiring that applicants for one-off houses in some parts of the county require to own 15 acres of land. This latter proposal created consternation among would-be builders of single houses and led to a rush of planning applications which all but swamped the council’s staffing resources.

Council chief executive Jackie Maguire has said that these applications will be dealt with under the old 2013-19 plan and that there is no need for applicants to panic.

The councillors have voted down the new guidelines in the draft plan but it remains to be seen whether the councillors’ strong views on allowing one-off building will survive examination by the Office of the Planning Regulator or perhaps ministerial intervention.

Before the outbreak of Covid, a new development plan could be expected to be voted through by April or May in the first year of its six-year operation.

The 2021-27 plan will go down in history for two reasons – the length of time it is taking to process, and the unprecedented amount of public interest in the plan. From the number of submissions on the plan received by the council - 2,452 (with two subsequently withdrawn) it appears that the general public, not only developers and planning specialists, are taking a keener interest in the process. Cllrs would say that that is a good thing and a clear strength of local democracy.

As the Zoom public session of the council came towards a close on Friday, Cathaoirleach Cllr David Gilroy was heaped with congratulations on the way he had chaired the proceedings over the long months since November.

Fine Gael Cllr Joe Fox led the tributes, saying that he had been very fair and had handled the meetings well, adding that the officials had “gone way beyond the call of duty”. He said not only had the officials to deal with 2,500 submissions but they had had to cope with an influx of planning permissions. Cllr Gerry O’Connor told the Cathaoirleach “You must have the patience of a saint”, while Cllr Aisling Dempsey and leas cathaoirleach said “You did a great job”.

Cllr Gilroy concluded: “We have met in 30 sessions over 82 hours and 40 minutes, had 38 roll call votes and there have been 2,500 submissions – it’s a testament to our work as representatives of our communities. And the willingness of the executive to help us on our way was always there.”