A city centre primary school is considering legal options as they continue to oppose plans for a supervised drug injection centre 150 yards away from the school.
St Audoen's National School on Cook Street often suffers from anti-social behaviour related to drug use. The problem is so common that the blinds in the classrooms are regularly pulled down to prevent the children from seeing people use drugs on a patch of grass directly opposite the school.
Parents say the medically supervised injection centre, which is set to be established in the basement of the River Bank building on Merchant's Quay, will exacerbate the problems. Following a Judicial Review lodged by the board of the school, the High Court decided to send the plans to An Bord Pleanala in 2019.
The plans were subsequently approved by ABP over the Christmas period with conditions such as an 18 month trial period. Principal Eilish Meagher told Dublin Live that the school's position has not changed since the last legal challenge.
She said: "The Board of Management of St Audoen’s NS are disappointed that a grant of planning permission has been made by An Bord Pleanala as of 22nd December. "We will be taking time to review and digest the decision and the report of the Inspector as well as discussing all options available to the Board of Management with our legal team.
"The school’s position has not changed since we successfully challenged the previous granting of permission in the High Court." Ms Meagher added that the location of the facility was "inappropriate".
She said: "Whilst we fully appreciate that there are people in our society who require important medical intervention, we maintain the view as previously expressed that such services are inappropriate to be located so close to a national school, attended by some 200 young and impressionable children."
The school previously argued the Government's "no-fry zone", whereby fast food outlets are not allowed to be established near a school, health policy should be amended to include medical injection centres.
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