Tag Archives: Liam Conneally

IDA client companies recently received a briefing on the state of the housing market in County Clare. Members at a meeting of Shannon Municipal District were informed of the briefing by Director of Services with Clare County Council Liam Conneally. He said that the IDA’s regional manager had asked him to prepare a presentation for the IDA client companies in the Mid-West, in relation to the amount of residential land and the availability of housing in the county. Mr Conneally said that they had wanted to hear about the future pipeline of housing, the number of planning applications received and granted, and short, medium and long term projections. He said that in Clare planning permission has been granted for over 1,000 units this year, and that there is “a considerable pipleine in the system yet to be acted on”. There was also a Q & A session with the company representatives and he said it was “a useful exercise”. Mr …

CLARE County Council has been requested to contact landowners to get their views before their land is zoned for residential purposes in the Draft County Development Plan without their consent. That’s the view of Clare IFA chairman, Tom Lane, who believes that it is unfair to place the onus on a landowner – who didn’t request residential zoning on their land – to be lumbered with the burden of having to lodge an appeal for exclusion. The Residential Zoned Land Tax is an annual tax, which will be first due in 2024 in respect of lands included on the RZLT Final Map to be published by local authorities on December 1 2023. Mr Lane said landowners can be easily identified by the Council through a search on the Land Registry. Many may even be unaware of existing residential zoning on a portion of their land. As land zoned residential is of much higher value, farmers could face the prospect of …

CLARE County Council is close to taking over a site at Shannon, where a civic building could be installed, this week’s meeting of Municipal District councillors heard. Giving an update to members, Director of Service Liam Conneally said that work is continuing on Shannon’s application for Urban Regeneration Development Funding. He also said that the Council is in the process of concluding the lease on the relevant site, and then it will come under the local authority’s control. The recently launched Shannon Town Centre Masterplan has a plan for something called the One Shannon Hub, which would have multiple uses, including relocated County Council offices, a ‘greenhouse’ which would be a space for a variety of uses such as co-working, education, and training, exhibitions, meeting rooms and conference opportunities. The building would also have a performing arts venue. Mr Conneally said a lot of work has been done on the brief and the proposed size of the building for the …

THE Clare economy is in a very strong position and is “providing jobs at a ferocious rate”, according to a leading county council executive. The Council’s Director of Economic Development Liam Conneally told this week’s meeting of Shannon Municipal District Councillors that many of the multinationals with bases in the county are doing particularly well. At the meeting Mr Conneally, giving an update to the members, said despite the pandemic, Foreign Direct Investment in the Mid-West had been “very considerable” between 2019 and 2021. “We are close to reaching full employment,” he added. He said that across the board, in terms of foreign direct investment, indigenous businesses and micro businesses supported by the Council, there is very considerable job creation. Mr Conneally said that sometimes the good work done by agencies of the State is overlooked, while he said the Council has been working very positively with the IDA and Enterprise Ireland, while he said that the Clare Local Enterprise …

LOCAL Councillors gave their backing to the Shannon Town Masterplan at a meeting this week. The masterplan has provoked a lot of local discussion in recent months, and was the subject of many submissions from the public after the initial draft became public. At Tuesday’s meeting director of services Liam Conneally said that there are two aspects to delivering the plan, one being statutory and one related to funding. He said that the plan will yet have to be incorporated into a review of the County Development Plan. Regarding funding, he said that Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage ahd rejected an application for URDF funding for the Venue development, due to concerns about the location and with making a significant State investment without the masterplan being completed. “The Masterplan is now nearing completion and a new funding application will be made to the Department in 2022,” he added. He said that the Department are anxious that an application …

CLARE businesses may be hit with a 3.8% increase in commercial rates, if local county councillors approve the first hike since 2009 in the Draft 2022 Budget at a meeting this Friday, writes Dan Danaher. With Clare County Council’s overall expenditure projected to increase to €138.6 million in 2022, up €7.8 million on the previous year, it is expected this proposed rates increase will generate an additional €1.3 million in revenue, if it is approved. The Clare Champion has learned that councilllors were presented with this proposed commercial rates increase at a recent briefing. In total, 3,430 occupied properties generated €37.2 million in commercial property rates in 2021. Ten levied properties pay more than €20 million. This income comes from energy generation plants, windfarms, global utility networks, national retailers and large industry. The balance of about €17 million is levied across 96% of properties in the county. While income from extra properties or new builds will generate an extra €1.15 …

Political manoeuvring will intensify amongst Clare county councillors ahead of a council meeting next Monday to secure support for a controversial €10 million loan for what has been described as a new public-private partnership to provide a major development facelift for Ennis. Ennis 2040 Designated Activity Company (DAC) has been registered as a company to assist in formulating identified opportunities for development and employment in Ennis and making the town an attractive place to live and work. The new high powered committee, which is chaired by former Roche Clarecastle chief executive, Gerry Cahill, includes TTM Healthcare Ennis chief executive Brian Crowley, Kieran Considine, head of AIB in Clare, Limerick and Kerry, Corporate Excellence Ireland chief executive, Linda Barron, Councillor Claire Colleran-Molloy, economic director of service, Liam Conneally and director of finance, Noeleen Fitzgerald. It is expected that Councillor Johnny Flynn and Councillor Ann Norton will become members of the board in the near future. This plan is expected to generate …

THROUGHOUT the recession all Clare County Council meetings heard stories about the complete absence of funds, but with the country coming out of Covid, things are very different. At Tuesday’s Shannon Municipal District meeting, Director of Services Liam Conneally said that at the moment “a plethora of grants are being fired at us at the moment”. He said that the “Government are trying to assist businesses, trying to assist community groups, trying to assist local authorities.” One thing he said he was disappointed about was that other Municipal Districts were doing better at accessing supports than the Shannon area, but he said this could be addressed. Mr Conneally said that there are some very good reasons to be positive about the economy at the moment. “A lot of new job creation goes unannounced. Another 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 jobs that would be added to a company, they mightn’t want it announced but it is happening. There is …