The Heritage Council is likely to find itself in hot water over plans to build a £1 million headquarters behind Rothe House in Kilkenny rather than take on the conversion of an endangered historic building on the River Nore.
Bridge House, with its bow-fronted windows, is practically derelict, though a 100-bedroom hotel is under construction on land to the rear, facing Kilkenny Castle. After examining it, the council opted for a new building instead.
Michael Starrett, its Northern Ireland-born chief executive, denied the decision amounted to a betrayal of the council's remit or that it would be widely seen as undermining its credibility in encouraging others to undertake the restoration of historic buildings.
According to one source, members of the council were given "pathetic, lame excuses" that Bridge House was unsuitable because its basement was prone to flooding and that there was no parking on the site. Their own architectural committee was "not even consulted".
Asked whether the council was prepared for the flak it was likely to receive from conservationists, Mr Starrett said every aspect of the plan had been considered and the council was "well aware" of the public relations "dilemma" involved in opting for a new building.
However, he believed the council "can do more in terms of the heritage of Kilkenny by showing what a new development could achieve on the medieval burgage plot of Rothe House", with the lanes on each side upgraded to make it more accessible to the public.
Mr Starrett said the council would continue to "work as hard as it can to encourage owners of historic buildings to re-use and conserve them". It also felt this objective could be realised by persuasion rather than deploying the sanction of its statutory powers.
Section 10 of the 1995 Heritage Act, which covers the designation of "heritage buildings" in public ownership, has been used only once since the council took office - to protect the former Wexford County Workhouse, not a particularly distinguished building.
Under Section 10 there is an onus on all public bodies to inform the Heritage Council of any plans they might have to alter or demolish a "heritage building". But as the council has not compiled a list of such buildings, the section is effectively inoperable.
Mr Starrett insists that progress is being made behind the scenes - for example, by carrying out an audit of heritage-related spending in the State sector and by working with the Department of Justice on how best to modernise historic courthouses.
The same "softly, softly" approach has characterised the council's involvement in the planning process. Here, too, the emphasis has been on broader policy issues rather than entering the bear pit of controversy over current planning applications.
Despite being a prescribed body under the Planning Acts, which entitles the council to be notified of sensitive applications, it has only lodged three appeals to An Bord Pleanala, though it has commented on others such as the National Gallery's Clare Street extension.
Mr Starrett puts this down to a "resource problem" - the council has only one planning officer - but he also insists that there are other, perhaps more effective ways of making progress than by "waving flags" and "campaigning loudly in the public domain".
Though he says the council is seen by some State agencies as a "blooming nuisance", some conservationists have come to regard it as little more than a "toothless quango" because of its reluctance to incur the wrath of more powerful bodies in the public sector.
Mr Starrett prefers to build bridges rather than to burn them. So the council is promoting a pilot scheme to employ heritage officers in four local authorities - Kerry, Kilkenny and Sligo county councils and Galway Corporation. "My own conviction is that the long-term way to protect heritage is through local authority development plans," he says. "Once the new architectural heritage package comes in next year we will have to move towards a more comprehensive listing system." The Heritage Council has a budget of £4 million, of which £800,000 goes on offices and staff. Last year it had to stop taking grant applications from the owners of buildings at risk because it ran out of money. An extra £500,000 was found to clear the backlog.
According to its chief executive, the council is "building itself into an effective organisation, geared up to proposing policies for our national heritage". He promised "a number of substantial policy initiatives" within the next year, all based on "sound principles".
One example cited by Mr Starrett is a scientific study it commissioned on the sand dune complex near Doonbeg, Co Clare. The dunes are under threat from a £12 million "leisure development". However, some members complain that the council is becoming a "rubber stamp" for decisions taken by its executive. "All of the promise inherent in the Heritage Act has slipped away from us," one of them said. "The staff are making it their own."