Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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267. To ask the Minister for Finance the progress of the living cities initiative; the number and locations of participants in the scheme; if consideration will be given to enable more participants to avail of the initiative by bringing forward the cut-off date which is currently 2015; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31612/14]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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Officials from my Department have held preliminary discussions with the relevant local authorities to identify the areas of the six cities, Cork, Dublin, Galway, Kilkenny, Limerick and Waterford, which might fall within the scope of the scheme. Each of the local authorities have now submitted proposals on the areas which they believe should be included. Further discussions will be held in due course.

An application for EU State Aid approval has been submitted and my officials are in contact with officials from the European Commission.

The Initiative cannot be implemented until EU State Aid approval has been received. Similarly, I will not be announcing the areas to be designated until this approval has been received and the initiative is to be commenced. 

It is important to note that I do not see this as a wide-spread Initiative, as it is targeted at those buildings in areas which are most in need of attention. This is a pilot scheme and I do not intend to extend it until it has been commenced and we can see how well it is operating within the current parameters as set out in the legislation.