This article is from page 2 of the 2007-12-25 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 2 JPG
THERE have been calls for Ennis Town Council to provide a more detailed breakdown of expenditure after it was shown that €38,000 was spent on training and sending coun- cilors to conferences.
Expenditure figures for 2006 re- vealed in the council’s budget, also show that spending on expenses rose by €2,700, from an estimated figure of €27,000 at the start of 2007, to 29,700.
The amount spent on members training and conferences was also up on estimated figures from €35,000 to €38,000.
Green Party councillor Donal O’Bearra said the figure was too high and has called for the nine-members of the council to be provided with a breakdown of what the money was Spent on.
“If you divide €38,000 by nine, it works out at almost €4,000 and then add on the figure for expenses, which works out at €3,000, 1t means that €7,000 was drawn down by each councillor. I can certainly say that I haven’t drawn down €7,000 or any- thing near that figure. I would like to think that we will be provided with a breakdown and I will be looking for one”.
Cllr O’Bearra also questioned the
merit of sending the councilors to conferences, saying, in his experi- ence, they were poorly attended.
Speaking last week at Ennis Town Council’s budget meeting Town Man- ager Tom Coughlan said trips abroad and conferences allowed members to observe examples of best practice.
He said, ““When we went to Brug- ges, it was allowing us to see best practice in operation.
Meanwhile, each of Clare’s 3,000 plus rate payers will this week re- ceive an abridged version of the Clare County Council Annual Report for 2007. This moves comes after a mo- tion tabled by Cllr Martin Conway (FG) earlier this year calling for the
local authority to be more account- able to the people who fund it.
This is the first time that details of the council’s budget will be posted to ratepayers.
‘For too long now we have had a situation in this county and in this county where there is not enough accountability. It’s all been one way traffic and | think that the rate payers deserve to know what their money is being spent on,” said Conway.
“I felt like there was no feed back at all to the rate payers of the county. But this will help keep people in- formed about the positive things that are going on within the council as well as the not so positive things.”