Storm rages over new Leisureland charges

Local swimming club representatives have described as “outrageous” the revised charges drawn up by Leisureland management and the City Council this week in an effort to broker a compromise deal.
The charges mean that parents of regular swimmers could be forced to fork out around €400 extra per child in 2015.
The newly-formed Galway Aquatic Community – which represents Galway, Shark and Laser Swimming Clubs, as well as Corrib and Tribes Water Polo clubs – will be protesting outside City Hall this afternoon ahead of a special meeting of the Council to discuss the ongoing debacle at Leisureland.
They have said the new charging structure agreed this week does not specify that the 50c levy per child is per every 45 minutes, while competitive training sessions last up to two hours.
Five of the seven directors of the facility’s operating company, Salthill Fáilte Ltd – councillors Pearce Flannery, Mike Cubbard and Niall McNelis, along with Roger O’Sullivan of Salthill Tourism and Vincent Finn of Swim Ireland – resigned since last weekend over proposals to increase charges.
As well as increasing the cost of pool hire, it was proposed to charge clubs a levy of €2 per child for every session. Following the resignations en masse, the City Council’s Chief Executive Brendan McGrath met with the manager of Leisureland, Paddy Martyn, and the two remaining directors (Mayor Donal Lyons and Cllr Padraig Conneely) and a reduced levy of 50c per child from January to July was agreed. The levy will increase to €1 in July.
However, one club representative said the charges had not been made entirely clear. “What was not made clear is that the 50c levy is being charged per child per 45 minutes from January 1 – this will increase to €1 per child per 45 minutes in July.
“Considering that most of the competitive training sessions are between one-and-a-half to two hours each, this would mean the levy they are charging the children is €1 to €1.33 per session until July and €2 to €2.66 per session after July – and that’s on top of the 10% increase in pool hire. This is completely unacceptable and outrageous,” one club member said.
For more on this story, see the Galway City Tribune.