Mr. Conn Murray who is here, is chief executive in Limerick and happens to be chair of the housing subcommittee of the County and City Management Association, CCMA, so may address some of the general issues too.
Sadly, the homeless figure fluctuates in Galway. We have 189 adults and just over 100 children in emergency accommodation. We recently opened the winter beds initiative, with which we increased capacity since last year. We will have 36 beds available and we also have contingency beds if that is insufficient. That will run through to next April and extend beyond that if necessary. We also have a men's hostel, Fairgreen Hostel, run by COPE, a homeless charity in Galway, with 36 beds which are full. The female hostel, where there are 13 beds, is also full. This year, we have allocated social housing to 20 homeless families. It is a difficult cycle and problem. We have another 49 families on notices to quit who will conceivably come on to our homeless list in the first quarter of 2019.
We have made a significant number of interventions to deal with the homeless challenge. It includes a homeless housing assistance payment, HAP, placefinder service which has been running since June. We have already been able to house 27 families under homeless HAP. Some 17 couples and single people who were registered have been housed under that initiative. I referred to the cold weather response. We recently purchased a family hub. Renovation work is starting next week. It will be up and running in the first quarter and that will accommodate 12 families. We are rolling out a modular housing scheme comprising 15 prefabricated two and three bedroom units on lands in city ownership. That will be up and running in early 2019. Through the Housing First initiative, where we set ourselves a target of 30 Housing First tenancies, we have also secured funding through the social reform fund, a philanthropic fund. It provides a wraparound service to homeless people who we are providing accommodation to and works with disability services, mental health services and the HSE. Work has recently commenced on a new domestic violence refuge in the city which will be ready late next year. That will provide nine additional accommodation units.
We have a rough sleeping problem. We have and will have beds for everybody who needs a bed this winter. The rough sleepers are largely non-habitual residents. They do not have residency status. They are generally eastern European. We have engaged with them consistently but they have refused offers of support other than winter packs. They are sadly destitute in their own countries. Young people going out at night might give them money etc., and they do not want to engage with services. They disappear the following morning and it is a problem we are trying to address. To be frank, a policy intervention is probably needed involving the Departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Justice and Equality, relating to non-habitual residency, which would help to ameliorate the challenge.
With regard to housing supply, very little private housing has been built in Galway since 2007. We estimate that there is a shortage of approximately 3,000 units. The city's population is growing organically by approximately 1,000 people a year. That would typically suggest that 300 or 350 units of accommodation are required to keep pace. We probably have pent-up demand that needs to be dealt with.
Extant planning permissions in Galway city can deliver 6,020 units. Our work on brownfield sites and the new suburb at Ardaun have the capacity to accommodate 3,500 accommodation units. As Deputy Grealish mentioned, we have begun work on Ardaun. In the past fortnight, we have attracted urban regeneration funds to deal with the access issues. That funding will go to site in 2019.
The city council faces a challenge in terms of its landbanks. We have 18 ha that are suitable for housing and are building on or are about to start building on 10 ha of that. The next 6.5 ha will go to site next year.
Galway City Council has approximately 2,300 social houses. By the end of 2021, we will have increased that number by 50%. That will create its own challenge for us in terms of the maintenance and management of the increased stock and developing sustainable communities, but we are making significant inroads into tackling the issue.
One of the quirks of the lack of private building in Galway is that approximately 85% of what is being built is either going to approved housing bodies, AHBs, or is local authority building. This means that there is a severe shortage of affordable and other housing options for people who fall outside the social housing qualification criteria. The situation is exacerbated because, on the one hand, those people are generally in rented accommodation and rents are increasing because of the market shortage and, on the other, they are under pressure to meet the Central Bank's mortgage affordability criteria.
I believe I have answered most of the Deputy's questions. If not, I will happily speak again.
