Business expansions and new homes halted by understaffing at Galway County Council

Employers hoping to expand and people wanting to build a home cannot get a meeting with planning staff in Galway County Council – because of a massive backlog of planning applications.

Applicants often rely on ‘pre-planning meetings’ which give them an indication on whether a planning application would be successful or if it required modifications.

A meeting of the local authority was told last week that the volume of planning applications in County Galway increased by 20% in 2021 – in advance of the new County Development Plan.

The Council’s Director of Services for Planning, Michael Owens, told the meeting about the increase in applications and outlined a lack of staff available to deal with the current volume.

Mr Owens pointed out that some of the existing staff had either cancelled leave or returned from leave in order to assist in dealing with the huge volume of applications that the Council had received.

According to Cllr Donagh Killilea (FF), pre-planning meetings provided applicants with either guidance or confidence with regard to their applications.

He told the meeting that there was a major employer in Tuam who wanted to expand but would not submit an application without engaging with planners in advance – but this opportunity was not available to them.

“This is holding up the whole process when there should be engagement with planners in order to progress this expansion and create valuable employment as soon as possible,” Cllr Killilea said.

This is a shortened preview version of this article. To read the rest of the story, see this week’s Connacht Tribune. You can buy a digital edition HERE.