WHEN the curtain falls, the best thing an actor can do is exit stage left. But the very notion of leaving the punters wanting more is lost on councillors in the Adare Rathkeale Municipal District.
The show must go on, and on, and on with this lot. Leaving the stage is the last thing on their minds, whether pursued by a bear or otherwise. The opera, as they say out in local government offices in one parish in West Limerick, is not over until the custard creams are gone.
‘Ah now Sean, pull yourself together. Don’t upsetting your auld pals in Adare Rathkeale,’ you might say.
C’mere, I have nothing but the utmost respect for all of them – before my old segotia Cllr Stephen Keary calls another kangaroo court into session – but their approach is somewhat unhurried, longwinded one might even say. I guess you can’t fault them for being anything other than meticulous.
Hold your whist now a minute, I’m only having a joke with ye.
Listen, I love venetian blinds just as much as the next man. Without them, it would be curtains for everyone.
Speaking of drapes, window dressing was very much on Independent councillor Tommy Hartigan’s mind when the subject of consultancy fees raised its ugly head at this month’s meeting.
Cathaoirleach of the municipality, Cllr Adam Teskey — the best thing to hit the Council stage since Kevin Sheahan — was in fine theatrical fettle and taking none of the executive’s jib when it came to the local authority coffers.
Teskey was not at all impressed that a traffic management survey in Adare emptied the piggy bank by almost quarter of a million euros. Highly indignant and flapping like the sails on Pat Lawless’ yacht, the Fine Gael man was put off the delights on the dessert trolley by this revelation, so aggrieved was he.
“I think my colleagues would agree with me that €245,000 on a 20-minute presentation … would have been best kept for after the bypass,” Cllr Teskey gesticulated.
His curtains were well and truly ruffled now, I could feel the draft from where I was sitting.
“I’m categorically stating here that Adam Teskey was unaware that this was going to cost the best part of €250,000,” he said in third person, like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, or Elmo.
“It’s gas the way the Executive can take several pieces out of the Development Plan now and deal with them in isolation.
“We spent hours at meetings trying to separate the Public Realm Plan from the actual Development Plan, but no. But now they are able to go at it and say, ‘we’ll have this, we’ll have that, and we won’t have that’. None of us were aware of the fact that there was going to be quarter of a million spent.”
Cllr Teskey asked if Mayor John Moran was aware that €250,000 was the cost of the Adare traffic survey.
“Does the mayor attend the directors’ meetings? Is he part of the directorate? If so, does he think it was appropriate for a quarter of a million to be spent?”
Independent councillor Tommy Hartigan agreed with Cllr Teskey’s sentiments and deemed the cost of the survey as ridiculous.
“The idea of doing it before the bypass is like buying the curtains before you painted the room to see if they were to match. It’s a waste of time,” he declared.
There you have it, folks — bring down the curtain, the farce is over!
