Cllrs vote down refuse fees rise – and cut rates by 1%

Date Published: 06-Dec-2010

By Denise McNamara

The Galway City Council budget for 2011 was passed last night after a coalition of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Independent councillors voted together to implement a 1% rates cut and overturn a proposed increase in refuse charges.

The €86m budget includes an increase of €45,000 on what officials had proposed for the arts budget and allocates grants of €10,000 to restore the city’s traditional boats and €25,000 towards next year’s Iron Man Competition and €9,500 for the Civic Trust.

The coalition of councillors led by Mayor Michael Crowe proposed savings of €605,000 on what the Director of Services Edel McCormack had drawn up in the draft budget.

They achieved these by spreading out the amount factored in for the Smart Travel bid over two years rather than one, saving €100,000 and including a bill of €305,000 for central government to pay for the domestic element of providing sewerage services.

Mayor Crowe said as a result of these savings, the coalition wanted to propose a 1% cut in commercial rates and fund the refuse waiver for the most vulnerable to the tune of €145,000.

An alternative budget, proposed by Cllr Derek Nolan (Lab), proposed a rates cut of 2.2%, which he said would lead to more jobs being maintained in the city.

Labour also proposed a raft of increases in housing grants totalling €350,000 and improvements to the Shantalla Community Park and the Terryland Forest Park amounting to €50,000.These extra costs would be financed by 2.5% cut in the roads funding (€216,000) and a further €305,000 reduction for the water department.

Both budgets overturned a proposed increase in refuse charges proposed by Council management – amounting to €1 a month for households – to cover the increase costs due to VAT.

Read more in this week’s Connacht Sentinel