Naas Committee Questions Long-Term Planning Of The Town As Units Proposed For Green Space

They wish to highlight their firm opposition to the plan to remove an established community green space

Naas Residents Committee have said they will hold a public meeting regarding their opposition to the council's proposal to develop seven residential units on the Sarto Road green in the area.

They wish to highlight their firm opposition to the plan to remove an established community green space.

They also wish to discuss wider questions about how Naas is being planned, how public money is being spent, and how existing communities are being considered.

A public meeting on the issue is scheduled for Tuesday, 1 September in the Town House Hotel in Naas.

In May last year, the early stages of a proposal for new social housing began in the area, and chair of the Sarto committee Michael Keogh featured on Kildare Today in November to speak about the issue.

Speaking on Kildare Today, Michael Keogh said that there are plenty of other places that could be used as residential units:

"You'd swear that there was nowhere else to build houses, Basin street has at least six houses empty, in the harbour there's another one, and there's three others as well [in the local area].

"That's 10 houses available to work on now without having to put a foundation in on a common green that everybody living here is entitled to.If they start taking our common green, who's common green are they going to take next."

He also criticised Kildare County Council, claiming that they provided written confirmation that the space would be kept as a green space:

"It goes back to saying that the council promised us a green space, when they knocked down the [previous] houses they said 'we're going to turn it into a green space' and we actually have that in writing from Kildare County Council.

"Then when they were doing the piling of late, they denied they were doing it and in the end they admitted that they were doing it. We're getting lies and lies from them and now we're meant to trust them."

In addition to this, he claimed that they were told "not one local person on a housing list from Sarto is going to get one of those houses [that are proposed for Sarto green]".

Kildare County Council have been contacted for a comment in relation to this situation.

The full interview can be heard below: