This article is from page 20 of the 2011-05-10 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 20 JPG
COUNTY Clare has missing out on millions of euro in annual funding allocated by the European Union (EU) because Clare County Council has not had a presence on the Southern and Eastern Regional Authority.
According to Cllr PJ Kelly (FF), more than € 440 million has been allocated to Irish projects over the last three years – but none of that money has come to County Clare.
“Last year Kerry, Cork and Waterford got a huge investment and we got none of it. We don’t seem to at the races for this funding. We need to have people who can see what is coming down the track and see what other people are getting and what we are not getting. We have got to look at this in the future,” said Cllr Kelly.
Speaking on this subject last night, the Mayor of Clare, Christy Curtin (Ind), said that Clare has not got its fair share of money down the years. Cllr Curtin also said that while successive county managers have made sure that the county has done well in terms of funding generally over the years, the employment of a person to directly interact with the Southern and Eastern Regional Authority would help the local authority to get a larger share of funding.
“The manager and his team of directors are very vigilant in terms of the money which is coming down the stream but we need someone who can tap into these organisations directly and see that we get our fair share of funding, which we haven’t got down the years,” he said.
This information came to light following a motion by North Clare Cllr Richard Nagle (FF) in which he asked what was being done to protect the Clare coastline from coastal erosion and in particular a section of road between Lahinch and Liscannor.
“I have a particular concern over a road entering the village of Liscannor. We have a situation now where there are more then 700,000 people visiting the Cliffs of Moher every year on this road and there is a large section of this road which is in danger of disappearing,” he said.
In response to this motion Director of Service for Clare County Council, Nora Kaye, said that a national directive on coastal erosion is expected to be issue in the coming weeks.