Donegal County Council has been asked to look outside of its own resources to find housing for Mica families and those on the housing waiting list.
The call was made by Cllr Gerry McMonagle this week, who highlighted that Donegal was dealing with a housing crisis on top of the defective blocks crisis.
The Letterkenny-Milford MD heard that almost 190 houses have been approved for the Defective Concrete Block Grant Scheme. A third of those homes are to be demolished.
Cllr McMonagle said: “We have families in houses that are not fit for purpose, they are damp, they are becoming worse with Mica. We’ve had a cold and wet autumn, and now we are in the winter and it’s not going to help these houses or indeed those families. We have not got adequate housing to meet the normal housing demand.
“What is happening now is the very few houses becoming available are hopefully being used for people in those Mica affected houses. It has a knock on effect on the housing waiting list,” Cllr McMonagle said.
Private rented accommodation, he said, was “nearly non-existent”.
Cllr McMonagle proposed that the council should look at all the options both from within council resources and outside in the private sector to put in place a timeframe plan. The plan would include temporary and permanent housing that will meet housing demands in the short and long term.
Donegal County Council responded to say efforts to find temporary accommodation have been hampered by a lack of staff. An application was made to the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage in October 2021.
“In the meantime, the Council will continue to offer the options to families in affected properties to relocate to alternative suitable vacant social housing units that become available,” a spokesperson said.
