This article is from page 18 of the 2012-10-09 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 18 JPG
AS MANY as three letters from the Minister for the Environment Phil Hogan failed to clarify the future financial health of Clare County Council.
At last evening’s meeting of the local authority, County Manager Tom Coughlan was perplexed as to what exactly the reply from the minister’s private secretary to the council meant.
The council had asked the minister to clarify if there was any chance of it receiving all or some of the € 247,000 cut from its budget in July.
In the letter to the council, the department stated, “Household Charge income will be kept under constant review and it is a matter for local authorities, including Clare County Council, to use their local knowledge to follow up on non-compliant households in order to maximise collection of the charge and the information available from the data-sharing exercises underway centrally to identify households that may be liable to the household charge.”
In a personally signed letter to Deputy Pat Breen (FG) and Deputy Joe Carey (FG), the Minister referred to a conversation he had with the deputies last week.
“I’ll be reviewing the position for all local authorities in November and will have regard to their respective Household Charge compliance rate,” he said.
Mr Coughlan said he was not sure from those responses if the Minister was going to review the € 247,000 cut or not.
“It is not for me to interpret,” he said.
The manager and councillors were also in disagreement about the department secretary’s suggestion that, “I am satisfied that the revised general purpose grant allocations provided for 2012, together with the income available from other sources, will enable local authorities, including Clare County Council, to provide a reasonable level of services to their customers.
“The budget as adopted is under pressure and there is very little scope for reductions going forward,” said the manager.
He said the council made a decision in July to continue with the budget as adopted and that is what he would do until otherwise directed.
He added he would make savings wherever possible.