{"id":431647,"date":"2026-05-04T11:13:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T11:13:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/431647\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T11:13:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T11:13:09","slug":"donegal-donkey-sanctuary-receives-devastating-planning-objection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/431647\/","title":{"rendered":"Donegal Donkey Sanctuary receives ‘devastating’ planning objection"},"content":{"rendered":"

The owners of the Donegal Donkey Sanctuary say that they have received a “devastating and unbelievable” appeal to a planning application which was approved by Donegal County Council.<\/p>\n

Plans had been filed as far back as last July, seeking permission to build a new visitor’s centre, containing a caf\u00e9, gift shop, classroom and storage, a hay barn with adjoining paddocks at their popular facility near Raphoe.<\/p>\n

According to the Sanctuary operators, an objection was raised by a third party when the plans were initially submitted last July. The council granted conditional planning permission for the development three weeks ago, subject to the moving of the entrance road to the sanctuary a number of meters to be in compliance with new sightline guidelines.<\/p>\n

However, the decision has now been appealed to An Coimisi\u00fan Plean\u00e1la by a couple with a Lifford address.<\/p>\n

In their initial submission to the planning commission, they raised concerns regarding “vision lines” over their site, which is close to the Donkey Sanctuary’s grounds.<\/p>\n

That objection letter, submitted on their behalf by MH Associates to Donegal County Council in July of last year, stated they had no objection to the development ‘in principle.’<\/p>\n

“Until our clients legally provide the required visibility splays to the Donkey Sanctuary, the planning permission, if approved, cannot fully comply. The applicants for the proposed development have never approached our clients to-date to discuss the visibility splays over their land,” their objection stated.<\/p>\n

With Donegal County Council deciding to refuse that objection and grant conditional planning permission, they have now submitted an appeal to An Coimisi\u00fan Plean\u00e1la.<\/p>\n

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The owners of the Donkey Sanctuary took to social media to say that the objections have “caused a huge delay in moving forward.”<\/p>\n

“For the last couple of years our team have been working very hard towards obtaining planning permission here at the sanctuary with a view to creating an even better environment for the beautiful donkeys in our care,” they said.<\/p>\n

“We need to emphasise at this point that this entrance road was originally passed for planning almost twenty years ago as it is in fact the road to our house. It is not a new entrance. Donegal County Council have been very efficient and meticulous in their handling of our application and we were overjoyed to finally receive the positive news that planning had been granted.”<\/p>\n

The Sanctuary has described the subsequent planning appeal submitted to An Coimisi\u00fan Plean\u00e1la as a “devastating and unbelievable decision,” and that the appeal was grounds for the Sanctuary to publicise the matter.<\/p>\n

“Unfortunately the couple who are objecting are not satisfied with this decision and have taken the devastating and unbelievable decision to appeal to An Coimisi\u00fan Plean\u00e1la in Dublin in order to stop the development. After much soul searching we have made the decision to share this public document which is freely accessible to all on the Donegal County Council planning site.”<\/p>\n

The Sanctuary has also pointed to historical objections which have been filed against their developments by the couple, who they claim live in Northern Ireland, or their extended family members, dating as far back as 2012.<\/p>\n

In a prior planning objection from 2012, the couple, and others, made a number of objections to other plans at the Sanctuary relating to traffic, the noise from the donkeys, boundary fencing, and parking.<\/p>\n

That objection claimed at the time that “…this intensive type of activity is completely at odds with general farm use and with good-neighbour activity.” Conditional planning permission was also granted by the Council to the Sanctuary in that case.<\/p>\n

The Sanctuary says that the latest appeal to An Coimisi\u00fan Plean\u00e1la means there will be a delay of up to six months to their new development.<\/p>\n

“We have never publicly shared our difficulties in this regard before and indeed it goes against our core principles of maintaining a dignified silence in the face of any opposition to our valuable work, but this latest setback is at the end of the day a strike against the donkeys and on that we will not stay silent.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The owners of the Donegal Donkey Sanctuary say that they have received a “devastating and unbelievable” appeal to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431648,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-431647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=431647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431647\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/431648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=431647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=431647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=431647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}