My own club UCD have received Premier Division licence(s) because of plans for the future. If an ongoing decision-making process is part of the application it's up to the applicants to anticipate other contingencies. The licencing determination process gives the applicant the benefit of the doubt until the applicant's ongoing process (in this case Planning Application re-zoning) to play out and reach a Final decision.
That Final bit is a clue to Drogheda's case and other's. Obviouly if there is no ongoing process during application for football Licence then the it doesn't need to be considered.