30 July 2003: Naas Town Council last night set a price of E142,000 for its affordable housing scheme on the Caragh Road, much to the dismay of a group of young people present in the public gallery.
The cost has been something of a hot potato for the last year as the price had escalated from the original figure mooted of E130,000 to over E150,000 just a few months ago.
At that level, councillors demanded that officials do all they could to have the price lowered so as to be more affordable for the 50 or so applicants who are unable to afford a house in the private market.
Officials had claimed they were unable to bring in the houses at a reduced price, even though the sites were made available free of charge by the Town Council.
The final E142,000 price was agreed by a majority of councillors with Cllrs Timmy Conway, Eibhlin Bracken and Seamie Moore voting against. Cllr Willie Callaghan absented himself from the Council Chamber at the time of the vote.
He later claimed that he would have voted for the affordable houses if he had been present at the time. “I had to take a phone call. My wife was ill. I had to take an emergency call,” he said. “I honestly didn’t know the Mayor was taking a vote.” (ED NOTE: The agenda included ‘to consider housing progress report - Purchase Price of Affordable Housing Caragh Road').
A group of despondent would-be house purchasers who had attended the meeting vented their anger at councillors during the tea break They said they were ‘disgusted at the carry on’ in the Council Chamber during the debate and vote.
Carol Harrington said: “We’re absolutely disgusted. We don’t feel the councillors have done us any favours in getting the price down.” She had seen a report on TV3 highlighting how affordable houses in Dublin were costing E85,000.
Peter Doyle, there with his partner Mary Ellen Mooney, claimed they were ‘led up the garden path. “Three councillors voted against it while one was absent and should have remained there for the vote. How can the Council donate a lot of money to the Moat Club theatre and make no effort to give a grant to make these houses affordable to us ... as they had promised at the start?”
Patricia Maguire said she had phoned Kildare County Council and Naas Town Council about last night’s meeting but had been given the wrong time for the start of the meeting. “We were not given the right information at any time by KCC or the Town Hall. The way they went about making this decision was very strategic and we should have been given the specific details of why they could not agree it at a lower price. They should say what the E142,000 was worth.”
Patricia thought that Mayor O’Reilly was ‘very dismissive of the decision’. “There are only 50 successful applicants. Why weren’t successful applicants given the opportunity to attend a meeting of the Council?”
All the young people believed they will never be able to buy a house in Naas and claimed that councillors knew this ‘as we were set between a certain income margin so as to meet the criteria’.
“We have been given a complete runaround by someone adhering to the guidelines at the other end of the phone,” they claimed.
“We were told that if we have a Council loan we cannot get one from another source to make up the balance of the cost. It’s still two loans we have to pay back on a miserable wage and they know we are on that pay level because they set the guidelines."
[ED NOTE: Cllr Mary Glennon discovered that the balance remaining after the Kildare County Council loan can be sourced from other financial institutions].
The group’s claim was refuted by Cllr Anthony Egan who listened to their complaints during the tea break. Patricia said she had been told by the Town Council ‘to arrive at 7.30pm' but the meeting had started at 7 o’clock and she had missed some of the debate. She criticised Cllr Callaghan for ‘being outside on his phone’ when the vote was taken.
On hearing this, Cllr Callaghan replied: “I’m a human being.”
Cllr Egan said he was sorry she had been given the wrong time for the meeting, but that it had not been his fault. “Our responsibility is we built those houses under given criteria for affordable houses. We gave the land free. It’s the Government that set the rules, not the local authority.”
She countered: “Are the local authority actually looking at the situation in Naas and reporting that back to the Government with a fighting stand for us? Taking it up with the Taoiseach and the Tanaiste?”
Cllr Egan said this had been done on three different occasions. "We have a responsible decision," he said. “Should we release those houses or let those people wait another six months for their houses? People on the list deserve an answer at some stage. I don’t agree they are affordable. But legally we can’t sell them below the price we built them for.”
Cllr Pat McCarthy said councillors ‘have been down this road every meeting for the last 12 months’ trying to have the cost reduced.
However Patricia was not to be stopped. “The immaturity and lack of professionalism in that room was disgraceful,” she said.
Cllr Egan said he took great exception to her remark.
“You are all fighting with each other and insulting each other in there,” claimed Carol Harrington.
Cllr McCarthy replied that if a decision had not been made, in 12 months' time theCouncil would still be there arguing about it. The matter, he added, has been discussed at every Council meeting for the last 12 months.
Patricia told the councillors: “I was told by Kildare County Council and by Naas Town Council to be here at 7.30pm tonight. It’s another typical example of the inefficiency of the Local Authority that rules our town. I am addressing the whole lot of you,” she stormed at the councillors.
Cllr Timmy Conway entered the fray, cup in hand, as did Cllr Seamie Moore who reminded the group that there is no land cost involved in the price of the houses, as it was given free by Naas Town Council.
“You have money in the bank,” countered Carol. “Why can't the council build real affordable houses as they do in Dublin at only E85,000?”
By then, most councillors had left for the start of the remainder of the meeting in the Council Chamber.
Councillors who voted in favour of the E142,000 price of the houses were Mayor Pat O’Reilly, Cllrs Mary Glennon, Pat McCarthy and Anthony Egan. Cllr Willie Callaghan had left the Council Chamber just prior to the vote, and returned afterwards.
