Budget for town cleaning tasks discussed
Councillors in the Ballyjamesduff Municipal District, who indicated they would like to allocate more funds to specific town cleaning tasks, were reminded of their priorities at a recent meeting of the local MD.
Independent Shane P. O’Reilly said, while Tidy Towns and other volunteers did “great work”, he had noticed a “decline in cleaning of signs and sweeping the streets”. In order to show the representatives’ commitment to these voluntary groups, he proposed allocating €10,000 to the area office to specifically support these cleaning duties.
Trevor Smith (FG) agreed additional funding is needed.
“For the maintenance of the housing estates, the Municipal District should be getting more rather than taking this from the road budget.”
His party colleague, T.P. O’Reilly, suggested the funds should be used “as need would arise” around the fair days in Mullagh or Virginia for example.
He further recommended such funds would need to be allocated for a specific cause, not just “a pot of money for general upkeep”.
Sinn Fein's Noel Connell said it was a good idea seeing as “many signs have gone green”, but questioned, how far €10,000 would stretch: “It’s a big area from Arva to Mullagh.”
Area Manager John McGahern reminded councillors of the priorities: “Some of our footpaths still have steps in them. €10,000 would fix a couple of meters of footpath in a town that would make a big difference to someone.”
While the councillors agreed with the sentiment, Cllr T.P. O’Reilly opined that the Council is “ring-fencing big projects and letting small things slip.”
Cllr Winston Bennett (FG) said the MD should ask the county to match their €10,000 for cleaning duties, questioning the logic in the recent hiring and associated costs of an Irish language officer: “We need to dún an doras and rather spend the money saved on the footpaths.”
In the end, councillors agreed to set aside €10,000 of their budget and lobby for more money for general footpath repairs in the upcoming Council budget meeting.