The Archbishop of Dublin, Dermot Farrell, has criticised the inclusion of Church buildings and land under a new residential zoning land tax which is being proposed by Dublin City Council.
Speaking to the Irish Independent, the Archbishop described the move as “an extraordinary attack on the Catholic faith”. But is this really the case?
While it is true that churches that are in active use are listed in the council’s Draft Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) which would see a three per cent levy being imposed on the market value of a property, the tax would only be applicable if the land was inactive or not in use.
24 churches and eight parish halls were designated for inclusion in the RZLT in draft maps that the city council published in November and the City Council has indicated that this map is still to be finalised and is going to be subjected to revision.
This will take account of the revised zoning in the new 2022 City Development Plan and as well as a submissions by bodies such as the archdiocese of Dublin.
A council spokesperson said: “It is likely that an increased number of the social and community buildings will be excluded from the final map”.
The draft map was drawn up based on the 2016 Development Plan under which churches were normally zoned residential. What the final map will look like remains to be seen.
The Archbishop has said that he only came across the issue “accidentally” and that “there was no consultation whatsoever with the archdiocese.”
He said, “I would hope that they would see the wisdom in reconsidering the decision. They are the only council in the country that has taken such an action.”
It is not clear whether the decision to include the Church lands and buildings, which are in active use, under the draft rezoning was an intentional act or whether it was a matter of administrative oversight or expedience.
In recent years Dublin City Council has demonstrated through its diminution of the Christian aspects of Christmas and celebrations of Ireland’s patron saints, that it is not overly accommodating towards the faith in the city where Mass attendance is currently at about 20 per cent of the population and dropping continually.
Confusingly, the issue of residential zoning of Church land caused some controversy in early 2022, where Dublin City Council received applications by the Dublin Archdiocese to have more than 30 churches across the city zoned as residential.
However, council chief executive Owen Keegan has recommended that councillors refuse almost all of the proposals, which in most cases would require church demolition were housing to be built on the sites.
Planning consultants representing the Archdiocese at the time said it had a “specific ambition” to support the challenge to housing shortages in Dublin.
Church figures were under pressure to respond to high level public requests from politicians to the Church to help with the housing and accommodation crisis in Ireland, which has deteriorated further with the influx of refugees from Ukraine.
The consultants said the current zoning “unnecessarily restricts consideration of the development potential of the lands” and that it was “more appropriate to support its integration to the adjoining residential developments in the vicinity”.
Critics of the application at the time implied that the Church was being opportunistic as many large churches built in the suburbs of Dublin since the 1950s are now seriously under-used, operating from a large land footprint. Critics said the Church was seeking to inflate the value of the lands by having them rezoned as residential.
Others went further suggesting that the Church should simply hand over the land for housing rather than seeking to financially benefit from possible sale of the lands.
It is unclear where the truth lies in the story. While the Archbishop finds it “extraordinary” that the council would want to “rezone these churches and the curtilage of the churches for residential use and take them off the Catholic communities”, it is not clear that this is what would happen or that this is the intention.
It may be an oversight, or it may be the case of a heavy pen on the maps, however it seems that any lands and buildings that are in active use will not be subject to the levy or any form of appropriation. That said, the Archbishop is right to raise this as a concern in order to ensure that his fears are not realised as it seems Dublin City Council is the only council to have made this “oversight”.