Regeneration Projects

5. Deputy Micheál Carrigy asked the Minister for Rural and Community Development and the Gaeltacht for an update on the progress of the rural regeneration and development fund application process; whether a timeline can be provided for the announcement and release of funding under the current round; and whether consideration will be given to projects such as Newtownforbes Community Hub in County Longford, a building of significant historical and community importance, to ensure that vital community services can be delivered and expanded for the benefit of the local population. [73186/26]

I have a question in relation to the rural regeneration and development fund, the timelines on its announcement and whether consideration would be given to a project, the Newtownforbes Community Hub in County Longford, which is an area known to both the Minister and the Minister of State, which is a building of significant historical and community importance. We want to ensure that vital community services can be delivered and expanded for the benefit of the local population. Research showed that groups were forced to seek alternative meeting venues and that a lot of groups were disbanded due to the absence of a central meeting hub within the village. We want to develop this in conjunction with Longford County Council and Newtownforbes.

I thank Deputy Carrigy for asking this. The rural regeneration and development fund, RRDF, is the major capital investment programme in the Department. It seeks to support large-scale, ambitious projects that can achieve sustainable economic and social development in rural areas. The focus of the RRDF is on rural towns and villages with a population of less than 10,000 people. To date, the RRDF has allocated over €611 million for 271 projects across Ireland, including over €13.2 million which has been awarded to six projects located in County Longford. The Minister of State, Deputy Buttimer, and I opened an RRDF call for category 1 proposals in February of this year. This sought applications for strategically important, large-scale capital projects that have full planning and all other consents in place that are ready to commence. The key focus of this call is to support projects to revitalise rural towns and villages, providing the necessary facilities and infrastructure in settlements to assist in attracting people to live, work and invest in rural areas while aiming to ensure that rural towns, villages and communities can prosper in the years ahead. The assessment process for RRDF applications received under this call is currently ongoing. Following the assessment of applications, the Minister of State, Deputy Buttimer, and I hope to announce the successful projects before the end of this calendar year. We are committed to ensuring that the RRDF will continue to support high-quality and transformational projects across rural Ireland. This is a competitive process and the quality of the application is essential. We will continue to work with Deputies in relation to RRDF projects.

The Minister used the word "ambitious" and this is certainly an ambitious project. This parish hall has remained derelict for a long number of years. A local community group came together and met with me and the local authority with a plan to transform this hall into a community hub. It is something that is much-needed and would create a central space for everybody in the community. Longford County Council has granted planning permission for a main hall with capacity for 100 people for meetings, events and gatherings, meeting rooms for local groups, organisations and people who are working remotely, and a high-spec industrial kitchen to cater for catering needs, with full disability access to all areas. It is proposed that the property will be professionally managed to facilitate the proper running of the hub. As I said, to make this project a reality, the hub committee conducted research in the local community and provided supporting documentation. It identified the groups, including new groups, such as youth clubs and scouts, that will form and base themselves in this new facility. I urge the Minister to support the project.

I have noted that. As I said, the fund is exceptionally competitive. Applications are assessed under the oversight of our project advisory board. The proposals are assessed in accordance with the published appraisal scheme, and we go through each application. As the Deputy can imagine, for projects under RRDF, each community has the same level of ambition as Newtown Forbes. We are going through them at the moment, and we will be making final decisions before the end of this calendar year. It is important that we are then in a position to move these projects on. I have made it very clear to my Department that local authorities and our lead partners cannot sit on this funding. I am not speaking specifically about Longford but other local authorities as well. The days of them sitting on funding and not moving on projects are over. We may have to make difficult political decisions in relation to the RRDF, including decommitting funding because it has not moved. If funding is not used, then we cannot invest it in new projects such as the project we are speaking about today. We are engaging with local authorities across the country in relation to the RRDF and the necessity to move this on. We will very much take on board the Deputy’s comments on the assessment process for Newtown Forbes.

I thank the Minister. I can guarantee, as the TD representing Longford, that any money allocated to Longford will be spent. A fantastic regeneration team has been set up in our local authority. As a local authority, we took a decision to raise the local property tax before the local elections of 2019. Ours was the first local authority in the country to do so. That allowed us to ring-fence funding to provide matched funding for these types of projects across the three electoral districts. That is what we have done. As I said, we took a brave step, which is now being followed by the vast majority of other local authorities. This project’s development is dependent on the funding being put in place. It is an opportunity to provide a much-needed facility in Newtown Forbes and its surrounds for many generations to come. As the TD representing Longford, I urgently request that we look favourably on this application. It is an excellent application, full of supporting documents, and the planning permission is in place. A community group has come together to make this a reality. I want to work with that community group to see this developed and open in the not-too-distant future.

I can assure the Deputy that every other Deputy and Senator has the same ambition for their community, and they would all have the same quality of application. We will keep it in mind. I would like to put on record my best wishes to Paddy Mahon, the former chief executive, who retired over the summer. I wish his successor well. Paddy is returning home to Mayo, where I am sure Castlebar Mitchels will make use of him. Paddy has left a fantastic mark on local government across the country, most notably in Longford, but also in Mayo before that. I can assure the Deputy that we have taken his comments on board, and Senator Flaherty has also contacted me about this project. However, this is an intensely competitive process and the quality of the applications is superb. The challenge is to transform those applications into delivery on the ground.