My Department was established in July 2017. Since establishment it has operated and developed an extensive range of programmes and schemes to support our rural and community development policies and objectives. These include the Walks Scheme, the Local Improvement Scheme, CLÁR, Town and Village Renewal, the Outdoor Recreation Infrastructure Scheme, the Rural Regeneration and Development Fund, the LEADER Programme, the Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme, Libraries Development and the Community Enhancement Programme.
Supports are also provided for areas such as Volunteering, Public Participation Networks and Local Community Development Committees. Funding under these schemes is mainly granted to local authorities, however, grants are also made to local development companies, local community groups and indeed community and voluntary groups at both national and local level.
With regard to funding drawn down by Louth County Council, the table below shows the total funding paid from 2017 to 2022 (to date).
|
Year
|
Total payments from DRCD to Louth Co. Co.
|
|
2017
|
€2.217m
|
|
2018
|
€3.156m
|
|
2019
|
€4.588m
|
|
2020
|
€4.591m
|
|
2021
|
€5.015m
|
|
2022
|
€2.389m (to end August 2022)
|
In a small amount of instances, for example where funding is not fully utilised, funding may be returned to the Department. In general, however, funding is on the basis of vouched expenditure. We have identified the following returns of funding to the Department from Louth County Council for the period 2017 to 2022 to date:
|
2017
|
2018
|
2019
|
2020
|
2021
|
2022
|
|
-
|
€31,950
|
€7,436
|
-
|
-
|
€276,155
|
