A parcel of land that has provided the boarding students of St Flannan's College in Co Clare with their food since the 1940s is set to create a €3.5 million windfall for the college.
The school is putting up the 35-acre farm on the outskirts of Ennis for sale by public auction.
The land was bequeathed to the college in the 1940s by a local farmer. The college has decided to sell the land as the boarding school is closing its doors next June. The school opened to boarders more than 120 years ago.Since the 1940s, the land has provided the school's boarding students with their food, though in recent years, it was rented out to a local farmer.
The parcel of land, which is zoned residential, has extensive land frontage and is adjacent to the €190 million Ennis bypass, which is currently under construction.
Over the past number of years, St Flannan's has been engaged in a significant expansion programme. The money accrued from the sale of the farm is to be ring-fenced for the development of the boarding school building.
The farmer who bequeathed the land inserted a condition that proceeds from the land be used for the boarding school only.
St Flannan's College Boarding School dates back to the 19th century. The building is protected in the Ennis and Environs Development Plan, which places restrictions on what St Flannan's can do with the building.
School president, Father Brendan Moloney, said yesterday that the creation of a third-level educational institute in the old boarding school building was one of the options being considered by a special sub-committee.
