Council to prioritise housing and economic development

Meath County Council has adopted its corporate plan for 2024-2029 which sets out the aims and objectives of the council over the next five years.

The plan was prepared following an extensive public consultation process and adopted by councillors who broadly welcomed the document at their November monthly meeting.

Chief Executive, Kieran Kehoe outlined that their vision in the plan is to "Make Meath even better". The plan's mission statement is: "Delivering Meath County Council's ambition and vision through strong civic leadership, innovation and community activism while upholding the highest standards of honesty, integrity and accountability."

The strategic objectives include public service delivery, sustainable economic development, housing delivery, climate action, diversity and integration, democratic mandate, age friendly Ireland shared service.

In line with the 2022 Census, the population of Meath was 220,826, making it one the fastest growing counties over the last two censuses. Mr Kehoe said 59 per cent of the population is at work, which is the highest in the county but that 43,000 people travel outside the county to work each day which was not sustainable economically and job creation is a key objective of the plan. Another objective is housing delivery and Mr Kehoe said housing delivery would always be one of the biggest challenges for local authorities. He said they would be promoting a robust and sustainable strategy but did point out that 7.5 per cent of housing stock nationally is in Meath.

Cllr Nick Killian congratulated the council on the document which he said was well presented and and noted that it had been done by the Council and that external consultants had not been employed to produce it.

Cllr Gillian Toole praised the plan saying it was great to have the vision but did refer to the earlier meeting with the National Transport Authority and Bus Éireann where she said many members raised issues that would be directly at odds with the decarbonisation zones in the plan and Meath County Council's own climate action strategy, commenting that there is "mismatch'. She added that targets were not being met because the public transport offering was "sub optimal" to a large part in this county.

Regarding Age Friendly Shared Service and the Age Friendly home initiative, Cllr Toole said that a discussion with an age friendly homes advisor is an option for developers coming to pre planning meeting and should be mandatory.

Cllr Maria Murphy also welcomed the plan and said: "You can see how our vision has changed and the county is maturing in areas like climate action, sustainability, age friendly and our new citizens. I think the objectives and targets and way baselines are set out is very useful."