Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 24 January 2023
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government
Implementing Housing for All: Discussion (Resumed)
Mr. Kevin Kelly:
We have acquired four properties by CPO. One of those CPOs involved a number of properties together and they are being redeveloped for social housing here in Castlebar. We had not used it up to that over a period but, as outlined, we have set up an internal cross-departmental team with the vacant homes office and environment. We employed an additional resource to specifically work on derelict sites. We are much more active in that. The name of the game is not specifically to acquire by CPO or to generate income from a levy. It is about getting the property back into use and that is the focus initially. There are risks when acquiring properties by CPO both legally and in terms of costs. We are committed to using that as a measure in the coming years.
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