COUNCILLORS from Adare-Rathkeale Municipal District expressed dissatisfaction over operational issues in the local authority this week.
The six councillors representing the district proposed at County Hall this Monday that the current bi-monthly meetings would revert to blended hybrid monthly meetings.
Fine Gael councillor Stephen Keary said he was not happy with the current system. He also claimed that the district members had been “hamstrung” by being precluded from sending letters to central government on particular issues by the Council Executive.
Cllr Keary also questioned why the Council steered away from monthly meetings.
“Are you afraid of debate?” he asked.
Fianna Fáil councillor for City East, Kieran O’Hanlon said he was quite happy with the current arrangement.
“A lot of councillors are in full-time employment. So between Strategic Policy Committee meetings and special meetings, there are already enough meetings, and that is outside of meeting their constituents and everything else,” Cllr O’Hanlon told Cllr Keary.
The new deputy mayor also took the view that the 11 members of the council executive in attendance at the meeting had more to do than attend meetings.
“You should be in more gainful employment,” he told them.
“There is so much preparation by staff for these meetings. We have more than adequate meetings already.”
Cllr Kevin Sheahan (FF) warned the local authority that no public representative will be muzzled.
“The executive are supposed to work with us and recognise that we are the policy makers. They are here to guide us,” he said.
“What is going on is not right. I am not threatening anyone but we are not going to tolerate it any longer. We are being denied the freedom to send a letter in a civilised manner to the relevant Minister or national organisation.
‘There’s a lot of State bodies but we can’t get them to come into our meetings.
“It is disgusting what is going on and I condemn it,” he added.
Independent councillor Eddie Ryan said there was no issue in the Cappamore-Kilmallock Municipal District if councillors wanted to send correspondence to any government department.
“We sent a letter to Minister Burke and we got a reply,” he said.
Cllr Ryan also pointed out that only one out of the 11 Fianna Fáil councillors on Limerick City and County Council were physically present at Monday’s meeting.
“And you were out for a while yourself,” he said to former party colleague Cllr Kieran O’Hanlon.
Independent councillor Jerome Scanlan agreed that councillors should be in attendance at meetings instead of via the online portal.
“When we are supposed to be here, we should be here in person,” he declared.
He was told that any change to monthly meetings would require a realignment of all meetings to synchronise with this change.
However, council chief executive Pat Daly said he would look at any operational issues that were causing the councillors concern.
A motion was also passed to set up a working group with council members to further look at the issues in private session.
