WOODLAND PARK IS READY FOR CHRISTMAS

OPEN LESS THAN A YEAR AFTER EVICTIONS

In the faltering winter sunshine, half a dozen workmen make last-minute additions to the Woodland Park Traveller site at the Inner Relief Road in Dundalk. It’s 11 months since 23 families were evicted for illegally occupying the site in an operation that put Louth County Council under an intense media spotlight. Things are different now, according to the council’s Director of Service Joe McGuinness, who is in charge of housing in the county.

In a week or two’s time, 12 of the people removed from the site in January will set up home at the refurbished site which has cost €450,000 to complete. There will be 14 families in all.

Four of the permanent bays will accommodate those from one extended family. These are houses, with a large kitchen with a wood burning stove and a bathroom, complete with a shower.

In addition, there are CO2, smoke and fire alarms inside and, Mr McGuinness said, the tenants will be visited and trained by members of Dundalk Fire Service shortly in fire prevention and safety.

But there are no bedrooms as, the director of housing says, the consultation conducted by officials revealed that Travellers wanted to sleep in their caravans, or trailers, which will be parked outside.

Three of these homes were damaged by fire last month, but the damage was ‘minor enough’, though it did stall the refurbishment for a short while.

The other ten sites are what are known as ‘ serviced bays’ where there is access to ‘ pay as you go’ electricity and water that will be hooked up to the caravans as well as an outside wash sink and loo.

Mr McGuinness said: ‘ We expect that those who have been offered bays here will be here in a few days’ time. We will have full occupancy at the site probably by the end of January’.

The site was last legally occupied in 2008, Mr McGuinness said, with two tenants who had previously been on the site now living in small houses adjacent to, but not on, the Woodland Park site. Over the years, the site had been vandalised.

Travellers returned to Woodland Park in April last year and 23 were here when the Gardai, acting on in- structions from the council, removed them on January 15.

The director of service says that in a review carried out before the occupancy of the site last year showed ‘ there was no demand identified’ for halting site accommodation and ‘officially only one person had expressed an interest in this type of accommodation when the evictions took place’.

Mr McGuinness said that some of those who were evicted ‘didn’t take up offers’ at the refurbished site. He added that while the full review of accommodation requirements is not yet complete in the county, the Travellers who have responded so far ‘all want group housing’.

But the council has ‘a good relationship’ with the people who have been allocated bays. Those who will be living here will be council tenants, subject to paying rent and to all the other responsibilities that come with the rights of having accommodation. There are four CCTV cameras mounted on top of long poles on the site.

They are not being monitored, Mr McGuinness said, but they are recording and the footage can be accessed by the usual authorities if something happens. There will be a caretaker here every day who will liaise with families and look after Woodland Park.

In addition, the council is providing loans to families through a government scheme that will allow them to buy caravans to move onto Woodland Park, as a number of them were impounded following the eviction.

The €450,000 cost of the refurbishment is ‘a reasonable investment’ the council director says. It’s separate from the €100,000 estimated cost of accommodating the evicted families in emergency accommodation.

He points to the fact that 12 are moving backhere , while a number didn’t take up the halting site offer, a smaller number didn’t present themselves to the council again. Some are also living in private rented housing sector. None, he says, are on the side of the road in Louth.

It’s a New Year shortly, and a new beginning. Hopefully the residents of Woodland Park can look to a brighter future now.