Ballinrobe based councillor Michael Burke has hit out at costs people must pay to connect their homes to services provided by Mayo County Council, on top of contributions to services and the bond that is levied on new developments after planning approval.
Cllr Burke raised the issue at the monthly meeting of the Claremorris Electoral Area committee. “For a person building a house in the countryside and they want to connect to the mains water and sewerage, they pay €2,000 in a bond after planning permission, €3,500 to connect to the services, and another €2,000 in an engineering charge for the services to be connected,” he said. “It’s an awful lot of money for people to hand over to the council, it’s unfair and unreasonable at this moment in time.”
Cllr Damien Ryan agreed with Cllr Burke and raised the issue of the engineering charge. “Is it now Mayo County Council policy to have only Mayo County Council people connect people to the sewerage scheme? Surely if someone has already employed a plumber to work on their house they could also connect the sewerage to the house.”
Director of services for Mayo County Council, Seamus Granahan, said the issue of the cash bond could be looked at. However the engineering charge was levied as a matter of best practice. “There is a betterment levy that we use to connect people to the mains and the sewerage, it is Mayo County Council policy that we are the only people who will connect these services up. There were a number of very poor connections done in the past which caused major leaks and problems at a later date”, he explained.
