€900k County Cork site purchase ‘absolute scandal’
Sinn Féin councillor Melissa Mullane criticised the price Cork County Council paid for the land at Kanturk, Co Cork, in 2008, saying the money would have been better spent doing up vacant local authority houses.
She has also claimed the price was well in excess of market value at the time.
A report on the matter compiled by council officials and obtained by the Irish Examiner shows that a site of 1.47 acres was identified in Kanturk in 2002 as being suitable for a fire station.
Council officials said that, between then and 2005, they had negotiations with the landowner to purchase it, but no agreement could be reached.
In November 2005, the council decided to acquire the site through a Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO).
The following year, the council was formally asked by the Office of Public Works (OPW) to proceed with the purchase as, at the time, it wanted to build offices there as part of the move to decentralise government departments — a plan that never came to fruition.
The report says agreement was reached with the landowner in 2008 to acquire the land under a CPO for €707,500, plus costs.
However, the following year, the OPW told the local authority it would not proceed with its decentralisation plans.
The council did seek to renegotiate to reduce the size of the site and a reduced price with the landowner but, according to the report, he declined their new offer and the matter was referred to arbitration under the CPO process.
It went to arbitration in February 2010. The arbitrator made an award of €705,000, which was based on the 2006 land valuation, plus costs. This decision was made in September of that year.
Council officials said the total costs associated with the acquisition, including legal/conveyancing fees, valuation fees, arbitration fees, and stamp duty, amounted to €183,886.92.
This brought the overall price to €888,886.92.
The report went on to say that the council is still trying to pursue the OPW for what it maintains is its share of the deal, €162,577.42.
Despite the fact that no fire station has been built on the site, the council says Kanturk remains one of three priority locations in the county for a new fire station.
The issue is set to be discussed at a county council meeting next month. In the meantime, Ms Mullane maintained that the land should never have been purchased for that much and was shocked that farm animals are still grazing on it.
“It’s ridiculous. In fact, it’s an absolute scandal,” said Ms Mullane. “We spent nearly €900,000 on it and imagine what we could have done with that money.
“We could have done a serious amount of work on council houses which are lying idle and brought them up to a standard where they could have housed new tenants.”
