This article is from page 4 of the 2006-04-11 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
CLARE politicians have appealed to their Limerick city council colleagues to withdraw their application to extend the city boundary into Clare, in light of a statement from Minister Dick Roche during the week.
The Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, said he was not convinced that an expansion of the city boundary into Clare was an option, “given the attachment of the people in the area affected to their county”.
The minister was responding to an application by Limerick City Council to extend its boundary into counties Clare and Limerick, an application that has been opposed by the two county councils.
“As a first step, I propose to invite the three (Limerick city, Limerick county and Clare county) managers to meet with me, to see if a suitable process can be put in place.”
Senator Brendan Daly (FF) has now also called on the city council to withdraw its application to extend into Clare.
“There is no point in following this application, when the Minister has said it is not an option,” he said.
The senator said that if the application was withdrawn, it would show goodwill between Limerick City and Clare County Council, allowing a good working relationship to develop for the benefit of the people living in the 1,621 hectares in Clare under dispute.
Meanwhile, Fine Gael Deputy Pat Breen has accused the Minister of “fudging” the issue.
“The Minister has taken a long time to deliberate on this. He said at the Ógra conference that he would make a definite decision. I believe he has now fudged it.”
While welcoming the Minister’s indication that the boundary should not be extended into Clare, Deputy Breen said, the issue had “not gone off the agenda unfortunately”.
Limerick City Manager Tom Mackey told The Clare People that he expected to get notification of the meeting with the Minister and two county managers shortly.
Minister Roche said there were a number of options which should be explored by the three councils.
“These range from increased cooperation on a voluntary basis, formal co-operation/service provision across existing boundaries, possible changes to the boundaries between the two Limerick authorities, right up to novel institutional arrangements, which could apply across the whole metropolitan area – for example in the area of planning.
“I strongly believe however, that the maximum consensus on such issues should be arrived at locally, in advance of any direction from central government,” he added.