Cork plan to give start-ups a leg-up

Cork County Council is to examine the possibility of providing a grant to help start-up businesses pay their rates.

The local authority is also drawing up plans to rejuvenate main streets in 11 towns in the county to help businesses attract more customers.

County manager Martin Riordan said he would study proposals to adopt countywide a similar scheme to one currently being run by Cobh Town Council.

He was responding to a request from Cllr John Mulvihill (Lab) who said his son, John Jr as a town councillor in Cobh, had introduced the initiative to help fledgling businesses.

The town council provides a grant for start-up businesses which is equivalent to their first year of rates.

Mr Riordan acknowledged a lot of businesses are struggling to pay.

A total of 79% of rates owed were collected last year compared to 82% in 2011.

The county council has not raised commercial rates for a number of years, but rate payers have total net arrears of €10.59m in Cork county, alone.

The council has set aside a bad debt provision of €15.88m for businesses who may not be able to meet their obligations this year.

Mr Riordan said 30 businesses are liable for one-third of the €98.8m rates bill for the county last year.

Despite the economic downturn, council officials managed to collect 98.8 % of the total owed, which was ahead of target as the council had budgeted to collect 97.2% of the total.

Mr Riordan thanked his staff for the achievement and also thanked rate payers who had paid.

Income from rates represents 30% of the council’s budget.

The manager said the big payers were multinationals or sizeable local businesses who were making money mainly through exports.

“The worst affected sector is the hospitality area — hotels — while retail is also in serious difficulty. Those operating in the domestic economy are finding it difficult to weather the storm whereas the export businesses are doing OK,” Mr Riordan said.

He said the number of rates accounts going into arrears had increased.

“People are finding it harder to pay. We need some approach for small businesses. We have looked at 10-11 towns and at their main streets to see what we can do to rejuvenate them. We want to come up with some initiatives, because some of the streets are beginning to look quite tired,” the manager said.

Mr Riordan also defended a decision to demand from new businesses the payment of rates outstanding on premises where previous occupants were in arrears.

He said it ensured a company could not close down its operations and simply start up somewhere else to avoid paying rates.

Cllr Donal O’Rourke (FF) also asked that some leeway should be given to rate payers in towns which were susceptible to flooding, such as Clonakilty.