Challenge to developers on Navan area plans

Dear sir - I welcome this opportunity to respond to the statement by Big House (Duignan & McCarthy) published last week. First of all, I utterly reject the suggestion by Big House that I am being 'disingenuous'. I leave it at that. Secondly, people have been asking me what is going on? What is the controversy about? I, my party colleagues, and Cllr Shane Cassells, as was made clear in last week"s edition of this paper, have been attempting to preserve the Local Area Plan process. Why the need to do this? A Local Area Plan (LAP) sets out a framework for developing important areas within a town such as Navan. It involves a planning process which recognises the legitimate interests of the private sector but, at the same time, provides a mechanism whereby the public interest is best served. The latter is done by way of public consultation. The people of the town are consulted directly. Without going into detail on why Big House signalled its intent to challenge the legality of the LAP 5 process at this stage - something it itself set out to explain in last week"s edition of this newspaper - and the immediate suspension of LAP 5 by the management of Meath County Council on receipt of the letter of intent from Big House and legal advice sought by council management itself, I believe that the role of the elected representative in Navan in serving the public interest is challenged by what is happening. This is something that no public representative can concede to. I have taken time out to read what ministers, TDs and senators said in the Dail and in Committee at the time of the framing of the Planning and Development Act 2000, which gave us the Local Area Plan process. The clear intent in the debates points to the importance they gave to this process. Only in the most exceptional circumstances could one imagine a valid reason for the abandonment of this process. Those circumstances do not now prevail in Navan. Everyone has seen what development without the delivery of services for the public leads to. And I mean the timely delivery of those services. In this respect, the draft Local Area Plan 5 was a fine example of where all interests were being taken care of. And the people were about to be consulted on this draft when it was withdrawn. I am asking that Big House withdraw its signal of intent to challenge the Local Area Plan process for north Navan and do not impede the process for Local Area Plans 1 & 2, where Big House has such significant interests of its own. In this way, the last three of the Local Area Plans can be made and the better development of Navan can proceed. Yours, Cllr Jim Holloway, Ferganstown, Boyne Road, Navan.