Council to grant planning permission for Patrician Academy

Planning officials at Cork County Council have confirmed that they have made a recommendation for planning permission to be granted for the redevelopment of the Patrician Academy Secondary School, which was badly damaged by fire in 2016.
The decision will now be reviewed and confirmed by senior Council officials, but it is expected that this will be completed shortly and the permission will be granted.
Welcoming the decision, Cllr. Murphy said: “I know this will come as a huge relief to students of the Patrician Academy and their parents, many of whom have raised this issue with me. This is something which I have been liaising with officials with for quite some time now, so it is great to see a positive decision being reached. Although staff at the school have continued to provide a very high standard of education, it is unfair on all involved to have temporary conditions in place for such a long time. Several parents have said to me that they now fear that their children will have spent their entire time as secondary school students in a pre-fab.”
Cllr. Murphy accepted that the planning application was a complex one. “The application was made by the Department of Education and involved interaction between the Department and officials at a very high level in the County Council. There were also several factors which had to be taken into account, such as built heritage, and I understand that is partly why it has taken such a long time for a decision to be made. Now that permission has been granted, the next step will be to push for a contractor to be appointed and works to begin as soon as possible.”