Cork County council CEO addresses councillor ‘threat’ of withholding budget

CORK County Council chief executive Valerie O’Sullivan gave a defiant response to what she described as a ‘threat’ from West Cork councillor, Joe O’Carroll, to withhold approval for the forthcoming budget until enough council workers could be seen on the streets and road tackling issues such as drainage and roadworks.

According to Cllr O’Carroll, who was speaking on a motion brought by councillor Tony O’Shea, the Government had promised there would be no reduction in services when town councils were abolished as part of austerity cuts more than 10 years ago.

“Prior to that there were five men working in Skibbereen town with a foreman,” said Cllr O’Carroll.

“There’s one man there now at the moment and he has to go to Rosscarbery, he has to go to different places. We do not get the same service where we do not have the same staff.

“The budget cannot be passed this year until we see enough men on the ground doing the work.”

In her response, the council CEO said that she wanted to address the remarks of some councillors, and those of Cllr O’Carroll in particular, following a debate in which most councillors praised the staff for their trojan work during the recent flooding, but complained about the lack of staff on a year-round basis in their respective areas.

“With this sort of threat to the executive that the budget won’t be passed until enough men are on the ground — well, the budget is to be passed or not as ye see fit towards the end of November,” she said.

“How any gathering of elected members expects us to increase the number of men on the ground — if indeed that is the right decision to make at all — by the end of November is beyond me.”

'SOUND BUDGET'

Ms O’Sullivan said there would be two separate matters for councillors to consider when what she described as a “sound budget” would be brought before them.

“It is in fact the most viable balanced budget that has been before you for many years, due to the good work and extra money that the Government has put our way in this particular year.”

She said that she wanted to keep people informed about the subject of outdoor staff and described councillors as being “consumed” by the issue.

“The approved number of outdoor staff for roads is 374 people, the actual number of posts that are filled at this point in time are 354, and that means there are 20 current vacancies in that number.”

There was a chorus of support from fellow councillors for Cllr O’Shea’s motion and each one decried the lack of council staff to undertake works in their respective areas.

In response to Cllr O’Shea’s motion, which called for a full-time drainage crew in each engineering area across the county to assist with keeping drains and gullies clear on the roads and streets of the county, the council’s director of services for roads, Niall Healy, said that a drainage crew was permanently assigned to each engineering area within the agreed operational plan for each municipal district in the northern division.

“In situations where an engineering area is under resourced, priority may be temporarily given to other maintenance activities deemed more urgent at the time,” Ms O’Sullivan said.

She said that the situation in the northern division also applied in the council’s other two divisions, the southern division and the western division.

“I am just wondering what part of the response the members didn’t understand,” she said. 

“The members know as well as I do that drainage is a priority in this county council and our staff.

“Gullies are cleared by staff in this county council, drains are jetted and never more frequently than they have been in the last few months and, indeed, this year as a whole because of the issue of severe weather warnings.

“So these are all the facts of the matter, coupled with the fact that we have come out of the wettest summer that has occurred for many years, the highest water table and the most saturated ground that the county has experienced in many a long year.

“All of these things contribute, plus the fact that we’re never fully funded to maintain the roads to the standard they should be in Cork County Council,” she said.

Cllr O’Shea concluded the debate by saying that the majority of issues with the roads would be resolved if the issue of drainage was dealt with conclusively.