Before outgoing chairman of the Ballinrobe electoral area committee Cllr Damain Ryan handed over the honours to newly appointed chairman Cllr Harry Walsh, he looked ahead to 2009 and the amalgamation of the Claremorris and Ballinrobe areas and feared that issues pertaining to Ballinrobe would get lost in the bigger area.
“We were well served as an electoral area but in the bigger six-seater area, Ballinrobe’s share of funding will be watered down somewhat,” he predicted.
Cllr Walsh said that the new bigger area, which would allow people from Ballinrobe to vote for a Knock candidate, was an “extraordinary notion” but he mused that “people do silly things at election time
