A member of the staff from Kilkenny County Council has visited the areas of Mullinabro, Newrath, and Cloone in south Kilkenny with a view to upgrading the substandard sewage system in operation in the areas, and plans are being made to invite community representatives to the area office in Newrath to discuss the issues involved.
The possibility of providing group sewerage schemes at Cloone/Mullinabro and at Newrath has been much debated over the past couple of months by Kilkenny County Council as part of the review process of the Ferrybank/Belview Local Area Plan (Cloone, Mullinabro and Newrath come within the area of the plan ) according to south Kilkenny councillor Tomás Breathnach.
Over the next three months a technical assessment of the areas will be undertaken to determine the best solution to deal with the sewerage issue at Cloone/Mullinabro and at Newrath.
There is a design already completed for Cloone/Mullinabro and this can be used as the basis for a scheme there. The design for a scheme for Newrath is more complicated, especially given the topography of the area.
According to Cllr Breathnach there are about 58 houses that need to be included in the Cloone/Mullinabro scheme and 56 houses in the Newrath area.
“Once the best option for each scheme is decided on it will go into the Rural Water/Wastewater Programme and the council may perhaps seek funding under the Small Schemes Programme.
“A key issue in relation to the both schemes is the level of grant that can be made available to households by the Department of the Environment,” he said.
Cllr Breathnach has proposed that the level of grant be increased to a minimum of €6,000. This proposal got the unanimous support of the council.
He confirmed significant progress has been made on the issue in the last two months and that he is conscious that this issue has been much debated over the years and people locally want to now see some positive outcome.
