Council to spend €70m on family hubs and conversions

Dublin City Council plans to spend more than €70 million fitting out family hubs and emergency shelters for homeless people over the next four years, according to contract tenders.

One source in the Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE) said the cost of converting properties such as former hotels and bed-and-breakfasts into suitable accommodation for homeless families has become larger than initially expected. "Once you start knocking down walls you start to discover a whole range of problems."

Many older Dublin city centre properties being converted into family hubs have presented unanticipated problems during the building works, such as electrical wiring needing to be replaced.

The total construction cost of refurbishing the first 15 family hubs nationally has not yet been finalised as some works are ongoing. The hubs are expected to be in use by the end of the year.

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Dublin City Council is seeking to appoint contractors to carry out conversion and refurbishment work to provide additional family hub and shelter accommodation over the next four years. The estimated cost of the works over the duration of the contract is between €60 million and €75 million, excluding VAT.

Tender documents

The refurbishment projects will be completed under an accelerated delivery programme, according to tender documents published last week. The work will be carried out for the Dublin Region Homeless Executive, which co-ordinates the four Dublin local authorities’ response to the homelessness crisis.

The conversion works will include fitting new floor, wall and ceiling finishes, altering existing floor layouts, fitting new cooking, bedroom and bathroom facilities, additional fireproofing of the properties, and decoration works.

The majority of Dublin family hub accommodation is leased by the city council. In most cases it has taken leases on properties for five years.

Several hotels and B&Bs converted into family hubs were previously used to put up families in emergency accommodation rooms on a night-by-night or weekly basis.

Work converting the former Lynam’s Hotel building on O’Connell Street into a family hub was expected to be completed by the end of June, according to city council monthly management reports from late May, but construction is still ongoing.

Local residents

The conversion of two large Victorian homes in Clontarf, north Dublin into a family hub has drawn criticism from local residents who are unhappy with the lack of prior consultation over the development.

Daithí Doolan, Sinn Féin councillor and chairman of the council's strategic housing policy committee, said the high levels of spending on emergency solutions like hotel rooms or family hubs would be more expensive in the long run compared to directly building social housing.

“After spending money on emergency accommodation we’ve nothing to show for it. We still have a lack of investment in public housing from the Government,” he said.