POSTER CAMPAIGN HIGHLIGHTING LOCAL VACANT HOUSE ISSUE
MORE THAN 40 vacant properties in New Ross have been highlighted with posters as part of a campaign to get Wexford County Council accommodating people in the town centre.
The campaign, by local People Before Profit members, is gathering steam and is attracting a lot of attention in the town.
The posters were erected by six party members during a recent one hour cursory scout around the town for vacant properties.
People Before Profit’s Susan Breen said: ‘We are trying to highlight the housing crisis. What People Before Profit want to do is to introduce a vacant property levy, where applicable, to have a fine imposed or even to CPO properties that are just lying idle in an area where there is a chronic shortage of social housing.’
Ms Breen said she and her friends found 40 properties in a quick tour around the town. ‘ They are long-term derelict properties. We found 40 but on the council derelict property list it says there are only eight, two of which are occupied. I have taken down a list of the properties and we are going to comb the whole town and hand the final list into the council. Some of these houses are beautiful large properties that could fit two or three families and yet there is a young mother-of-two going into Christmas with no home in her town.’
Susan said she was surprised by how many derelict properties were on certain streets in the town.
‘I would have thought one per street but when you start putting up the posters and start seeing that there are three or more, you realise oh my God they are everywhere. The council are depending on the private rental market which is never going to bode well for people who are in need of a public housing. It’s an ideological approach.’