The elected members of Ballina Town Council are to get an up to date progress report on the situation regarding the take over of estates in the town following a motion proposed by Fine Gael councillor Michelle Mulherin this week. Cllr Mulherin told the meeting there are a number of estates in the town that have a variety of issues to be sorted out before the council will take them in charge, and that the members do not know what these issues are. She said that it gets frustrating when residents come to councillors for advice and to see how things are progressing. “We need a baseline to work from, so we can ascertain where these estates stand at the present,” she said.
There was cross party support and support from Independent councillors for the motion, with Independent councillor Peter Clarke seconding the motion.
“This brings me back to 35 years ago when I was sitting in the old chamber of this council and we were discussing this very problem, and one of the estates that has been mentioned here still is a major problem,” Independent councillor Gerry Ginty told the meeting. “We had a problem with it then and we have a problem with it now. I was speaking to a man in the town recently who produced a cutting from a paper from 35 years ago where I was raising this issue and it’s still there with one estate.”
Fianna Fáil councillor Willie Nolan told the meeting: “We have 72 estates in Ballina and we have to make more strides in this area or the problem will never be solved.” Town engineer Michael O’Grady told the meeting that there would be no problem in issuing a report to the members in the future.
