This article is from page 22 of the 2014-06-10 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 22 JPG
THE number of front-line outdoor workers employed by Clare County Council will remain broadly the same as the numbers previously employed by the local authority and the now defunct authorities Ennis, Shannon, Killaloe, Kilrush and Kilkee.
At yesterday’s June meeting of Clare County Council, County Manager Tom Coughlan said that the council has been instructed to put in place a single management system for the entire county but services will continue to be delivered by workers based in their own municipal area.
The change will see some of the management functioned centralised to Ennis, while the front-line services will be delivered by staff based out of local offices.
“We are very clearly directed by government that there will be a single authority.
“There has to be a county-wide structure, without duplication of services. That is the bottom line,” said Mr Coughlan.
“There will be no reduction in the outdoor staff.
“The outdoor staff will be working in the same areas as they are at the moment.
“There is no suggestion that staff in Loop Head, for example, will be assigned to work in other parts of the county.
“There is a limited number of staff in the organisation. My job is to manage the staff that I have as best as I can.
“We are recording the levels of activities in each municipal district and if there is insufficient staff in some areas, then we will have to deal with that.
“Let’s see how things work out for the first six months – if it is necessary to take staff from the central area and redeploy them to the municipal districts then that is what we will do.”
It was confirmed yesterday that large-scale projects, such as road works, will not be bound by the municipal boundaries.