Half of the Notice of Motion allocation money for the Swinford area for local road improvements in 2012 had not been allocated as of Tuesday of this week, it has emerged. Each county councillor that sits on Mayo County Council is given an allocation, known as a Notice of Motion allocation for improvement works to be carried on specific local roads as dictated by them, each year by Mayo County Council. This years adopted Roadwork’s Scheme for Mayo County Council, saw each of the 31 councillors in Mayo get allocated €30,000 for these Notice of Motion allocations, which the councillors had already approved in the yearly budgetary process. The councillors also get a allocation of €27,500 of a special allocation for surface dressing each year, and also up to this year were given an allocation for local improvement scheme (LIS ) for use on private roads of constituents, which was removed by the Government to much anger of elected councillors.
The issue of the non-allocation of half of the funding under the Notice of Motion allocation in the Swinford area came up at the November meeting of the electoral area committee this week.
Cllr Joe Mellett was looking for the council to carry out some more work at Treenduff, Bohola, where there is a flooding issue. Paul Dolan for Mayo County Council told the meeting that a Notice of Motion allocation would be needed by the council to get the work done. Cllr Mellet responded that he did not think there was any Notice of Motion money left for such work.
However Mr Dolan responded by telling the meeting: “There is 50 per cent of the Notice of Motion allocation still unallocated and it’s the middle of November. If it’s not allocated by the end of the year it will be gone.” There are four members of the Swinford Electoral Area, Fine Gael councillors Joe Mellett and Eugene Lavin, Sinn Féin councillor Gerry Murray and Fianna Fáil councillor Jimmy Maloney, with each councillor getting €30,000, a total of €120,000 this year with €60,000 still to be allocated under the Notice of Motion. The council’s own adopted roadworks programme said that the councillors should have made their allocations by May 25 this year, or it may be rolled back into the general maintenance fund.
