Castlebar Town Council approves €20k for Love Castlebar

Castlebar Town Council approves €20k for Love Castlebar


Councillor argues that Love Castlebar are keeping painters and decorators out of work

Edwin McGreal

Castlebar Town Council has approved the funding of €20,000 from its budget to the Love Castlebar civic pride initiative.
One of Love Castlebar’s current initiatives is the painting and restoring by volunteers of vacant premises in the town but one councillor argued that this was keeping painters and decorators out of work.
However, the allocation of €20,000 which the council had earmarked in its budget for a task force for the promotion of Castlebar was passed by a majority of councillors.
There were some questions at the April monthly meeting of the authority, after a presentation from Helen O’Hara and Mark Basquille of Love Castlebar, if the council was within its remit to vary the allocation to allow Love Castlebar to receive it.
Initially Cllr Ger Deere suggested that €15,000 be allocated to Love Castlebar and the remaining €5,000 go towards the newly opened Local Enterprise Office (LEO). This was seconded by Cllr Blackie Gavin before Cllr Harry Barrett objected, saying ‘I fail to see how LEO have muscled in on this funding situation’.
Cllr Therese Ruane said the council agreed in theory to providing the €20,000 once they got a suitable proposal and described what was handed in by Love Castlebar as ‘imaginative’ and praised the calibre of people involved. Cllr Deere agreed to amend his proposal, as did Cllr Barrett.
However Cllr Michael Kilcoyne said he could not agree with them.
“We cannot give €20,000 for one thing in January and change it eight or ten weeks later. Love Castlebar are doing an excellent job but last week I got calls from painters to say they are unemployed and cannot get work around the town because of what Love Castlebar are doing.
“Some people are saying as well that many of the owners of the buildings are well able to pay for the labour,” said Cllr Kilcoyne, who said he would agree to €15,000 going to Love Castlebar and €5,000 to Castlebar Social Services.
Cllr Brendan Henaghan said €20,000 had been put aside for a task force to promote Castlebar and argued that, in the Love Castlebar representatives in the council chamber, ‘this task force is here tonight’.
“The work they do is just fantastic,” he added.
Helen O’Hara of Love Castlebar said building owners are paying for the paint and a private donation is paying for others who cannot pay.
Cllr Ger Deere lashed out at Cllr Kilcoyne.
“I’m sick to the teeth of this kind of stuff. With the Tidy Towns I was told before that we were doing street sweepers out of work. We do this work because we love Castlebar,” he said.
The €20,000 allocation was given to Love Castlebar.