The Western Writers’ Centre must be included in the Galway City Council’s Galway Arts Plan 2009 as it is working to “preserve and encourage the unique literary heritage of the west”.
This is the view of Labour Party president and Galway West TD Michael D Higgins. He has written to City Hall calling for the centre to be included in the council’s plan and demanding that its “modest request for more funding” not be ignored.
Dep Higgins said failing to do this would “rob not only Galway but the entire west of an invaluable cultural resource”. In his letter he pointed out that the centre, while based in Galway, has expanded into Clare, Limerick, Kerry, and Cork.
He added that funding for the centre would also allow it to “properly preserve the literary artefacts” that have been entrusted to its care.
“It is a unique organisation in the west,” Dep Higgins wrote, “having been the sole group chosen by the Arts Council Touring Experiment to tour a group of Irish language writers, as well as offering the only literary newsletter to be found outside of Dublin.”
