Councillors agree Council budget of €333m for 2023

After a marathon 10-hour meeting Councillors last night agreed Fingal County Council’s 2023 budget of €333m which is an 11% increase on last year.

The increased budget will allow Fingal County Council to continue providing a high level of service to its 329,218 residents and represents an expenditure of €1,013 per head of population.

The 2023 Budget was prepared within the challenging circumstances caused by the ongoing international geopolitical and economic uncertainty and had an overall objective of maintaining and enhancing the delivery of key services as well as continuing to put the financial foundations in place to deliver required infrastructure across the County.

Energy costs are budgeted to rise by €4.5m in 2023 while payroll costs will increase by €9.2m which includes the recent public sector wage agreement. 

An extra €4.8m has been provided in the Operations budget which will mean extra funding for works programmes, parks and open spaces, public conveniences and solar bins.

There is an increase of €8.2m in the Housing budget which will go towards additional housing delivery through Approved Housing Bodies and Rent Assistance Schemes while an extra €1.9m is being provided as additional funding for community centres and community groups.

Almost half of the Council’s income (47%) will come from commercial rates with grants providing a further 27% with 7% from rents, 5% from Irish Water, 3% from the Local Property Tax and 11% from other sources.    

The Mayor of Fingal, Cllr Howard Mahony, said: “Given the challenges that lie ahead it is extremely positive that we have been able to increase our budget by 11% and ensure that we continue to deliver our services to the public.“

Fingal County Council Chief Executive AnnMarie Farrelly said: “I want to thank the elected members. We have worked hard with them over the past few months to come up with a budget for 2023 that takes into account the uncertainty that lies ahead while at the same time ensuring that we continue to provide a high level of service to our citizens and businesses as well as investing in the infrastructure around the county.”

Housing and building accounts for 30% of the budget with the Council managing and maintaining over 6,400 homes in 2023 and expecting to deal with 15,000 maintenance requests and provide an annual service for around 5,000 home heating installations. Expenditure of €2.5m has been budgeted for homeless services.

A provision of €11.3m has been made for the on-going programme of general maintenance and improvement of the 1,275km of regional and local roads in the county while there is a provision of €7.3m for street cleaning including an extra €515,000 being set aside for new solar bins. The rollout of additional solar compactable bins will continue in 2023 targeting areas of high footfall while an additional provision of €20,000 has been made in each area for the replacement and installation of standard street bins.

Almost €20m has been set aside for the ongoing maintenance of over 5,000 acres (2,000 Ha.) of open spaces, regional parks and sporting facilities which are key elements of Fingal’s green infrastructure. Funding is also included for the continued improvement of playing pitches, playgrounds and sports facilities with €1.2m being made available for minor improvement works in parks and open spaces under the Area Programme of Works which will be presented to the Area Committees in early 2023.

The budget includes allocations to the following key areas:

€100.9m - Housing & Building

€38.6m - Road Transport & Safety

€21.4m - Water Services

€29.6m - Development Management

€53.7m - Environmental Services

€62.8m - Recreation & Amenity

€1.6m - Agriculture, Education, Health & Welfare

€25.1m - Miscellaneous Services

Councillors also agreed to leave the Annual Rate on Valuation (ARV) unchanged for 2023.

The Budget comes on the back of Fingal’s three-year, €989m Capital Programme which was presented to Councillors in October. Money from the programme will be spread across approximately 266 county-wide projects.

To read the 2023 Annual Budget please click here.

To watch the Council Budget meeting please click here.