Noonan’s Road residents ‘plagued’ by people trying to get into empty flats

Some vacant council flats on Noonan’s Rd are being used for drug-taking and other antisocial activities, a general election candidate has claimed, while calling for greater security and vigilance from Cork City Council and An Garda Síochána.

Mick Finn, a former lord mayor of Cork who is running in the upcoming general election, said he had been contacted by residents concerned about antisocial behaviour in some vacated social housing flats that have not been properly secured.

“Some of the flats on Noonan’s Rd have been shuttered, but some of them haven’t, and you’ve people coming in using them to shoot up and take drugs,” Mr Finn said.

Last September, council tenants in the Noonan’s Road area flats were told by Cork City Council that it favours rehousing tenants, demolishing the dilapidated blocks, and redeveloping the sites.

That rehousing announcement came after a tenants’ campaign last summer, highlighted by The Echo, protesting against rodent-infested, mould-ridden housing conditions subsequently described by the council’s then CEO Ann Doherty as “shocking”.

Since then, residents have been moving out, and half of the 60 flats on Noonan’s Rd are shuttered, but residents say as many as 50 are vacant.

Mr Finn said that all of the vacant properties on Noonan’s Rd needed to be properly secured until everyone has moved out and the buildings can be demolished.

“Increased security and vigilance around the flats is needed from the council and the gardaí, and we need a clear timeline from the council, too,” he said.

One resident, who asked to remain anonymous, said approximately 20 flats on Noonan’s Road were empty, but are not boarded up.

“We’ve been plagued by people coming up trying to get into them,” they said.

“There were people hanging around last week, trying doors and trying to get in, in broad daylight, and we ended up having to call the guards on them.”

William O’Brien, a local community activist who has been instrumental in the campaign to highlight issues in social-housing flats on Noonan’s Rd, St Finbarr’s Rd, Fort St, and Dean St, said: “There are elderly residents and people with disabilities who are waiting to be allocated new homes, and in the residents’ committee we have asked for a speedier allocation for people.

“It’s an unfortunate fact of life that the addiction problem is coming up from the city centre to people’s doorsteps, so security is vital for the people left living in that neighbourhood.

“You have children going to school and seeing the effects of addiction outside their doors; it’s becoming a black spot and it’s becoming a major health and safety problem.”

Last month, Cork City Council told Social Democrats councillor Pádraig Rice that €182,246 has been spent by the local authority on shutters to secure council-owned vacant and derelict properties in the first three quarters of 2024, with Niall Ó Donnabháin, the council’s director of services in housing operations, specifically citing Noonan’s Rd as one of the areas where expenditure on shuttering had been required.

A Garda spokesperson said the force does not respond to third-party statements. Cork City Council was asked for comment.