A new project has been launched to ‘empower’ the people of Connemara to deal with a dearth of affordable housing for local people – in a region where up to two-thirds of properties are holiday homes or short-term lets.

As a first step in the process, Connemara West and FORUM Connemara have launched a housing affordability survey which seeks to gather information on the challenges faced by would-be homeowners in Connemara, and to raise awareness of their plight.

Connemara West Chairperson, Kevin Heanue, says while there is plenty of data that shows the ‘insurmountable gap’ between local incomes and local house prices, the survey seeks to put real faces to those issues – and to start a movement locally around finding new ways to deliver homes for local people.

“The survey is the first step in a process. There is varying awareness of affordable housing schemes, but the solution might be something else. We have opportunities in cooperative housing schemes, community land trusts and community-led housing. These are all relatively new and don’t exist in Connemara,” said Mr Heanue.

“When we have the survey results, we plan to have face-to-face sessions to provide information on these options.”

As part of the project, they are drawing on the expertise of people such as Harrison Gardner of the ‘Build Your Own Home’ series on RTE, and CEO of O’Cualann Co-Housing Alliance in Dublin, Hugh Brennan.

“We are working with Hugh, a local landowner and Galway County Council to look at the possibilities for affordable housing in Letterfrack, for example,” said Mr Heanue.

“We want to give the tools to people so they can take the initiative themselves. And in addition to that, we will from the survey be able to provide grounded evidence to Galway County Council about what’s required. All the information is there from the CSO around incomes and house prices, but this will be grounded information from local people,” he continued.

Caption: Kevin Heanue.

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