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About LinkBacksYou obviously don't know him that well considering his name is PA and not PAT.Originally Posted by madmick
You obviously don't know him that well considering his name is PA and not PAT.
Having only gotten involved in fermoy town council at the last election i have seen first hand the carry on. Such rubbish will continue if a majority of the councillors meet in secret outside the council and agree to vote together on every issue. Does this happen in every other council
But isn't it the case now that one of those 5 are breaking ranks to go with public opinion in the run up to June? A few votes lately haven't gone the way people who follow Fermoy TC have come to expect...
Are you surprised that some of the Councillors are running scared. You cannot flip two fingers at the people who elected you and expect to be reelected. Should be interesting in june and in the run up. What will the answer to the question "what have you done for Fermoy?" be I wonder. For some councillors nay was the only word they uttered for five years.
30??? Seriously??? Why is that, is it because people aren't happy the town council are doing their job??? Also i think it would be great to see someone like Douglas get on. A quick trawl through the County Council website shows the state of local Cllrs and there is an alarming lack of young faces in there.....The word in Fermoy is that there could be as many as 30 candidates for the town council this June
I am sad to say but it seems a common enough view in and around the town of Fermoy that in more recent years the Council is, as the opening post suggests, a Circus.
Fermoy is a beautiful town, the Blackwater a wonderful amenity, we have good schools, great clubs, a fine town park, it's a town with a lot to offer if you chose to avail of it. Yet and especially in light of recent job losses and job relocation, you get a sense that one morning you'll wake up and there will be a 'Closed' sign on the edge of town.
'What is it I expect from my local Councillor', I ask myself.
Well I'd like to feel that the person was intelligent and honourable enough to represent me for starters.
To my mind spending five thousand euro a week to keep the town litter free is not intelligent. There are ways of promoting a 'keep the town sweet' attitude among locals and the use of such public monies directed in a more positive and sustainable way.
We need a ten year plan for Fermoy so hopefully enough debate can be generated by this election to give the candidates a stronger manifesto and a clearer view ahead.
The river is our strongest amenity, Fermoy should be the river sport and fishing capital of the south. But what have we got, a needless dispute regarding the thoughtless distruction of the weir. If the Council at least maintained and ultimately added another fish pass, they could spend there time more productivly than passing the hot potatoe.
And should we not be generating the town lights at least, from the river.?
Someone suggested to me recently that it would be a good idea to consider the possibility of creating a lake on the Tallow side of town to give the water somewhere to go and relieve the flooding. This creates another amenity as opposed to barricading up one we already have.
I'd better stop before I sound like an 'opposition bench' politician (no disrespect to present opposition parties) and we all know what a waste of time that style of politics is. It's time for well considered and brave decisions.
Build the hotel the town so needs, but for pity sake build it somewhere sensible, not slap dab in the middle of town. If anything a river amenity and local heritege centre should be built on the site of Fermoy House. Put the hotel on the northern side of town where there's plenty space to accommodate it.
What do you guys think?
A lot of interesting points made there, but some ideas may not be feasible. For example, if the current hotel proposal doesnt go through, what's to say someone else will come along to build on an alternative site.
The problem with local politics in Fermoy is thus
1) not enough people care enough to digest what town councillors are saying/doing week in week out. I despair when I see some of the stuff in the local papers and am amazed more isnt made of councillors stances on expenses and street cleaning (5 grand a week is disgraceful). yet people remember their names and when people vote for town council out of a sense of democratic duty rather than having informed themselves of the candidates, as i feel many do, they then tick the boxes of the names they notice. That's why I hope the likes of Noel McCarthy and Adam Douglas continue to get themselves in the paper - recognition alone will win them votes I believe.
2) the old boys club - anyone who pays attention in Fermoy will know who i mean, the ones who focus on getting their 100 or so 1st preferences from a group like the tidy towns crew, and who in turn approve 5k a week to secure their votes
Dude my thinking on the matter of a hotel in Fermoy is that the town needs a hotel big time, just not a hotel with ex amount of houses attached at the hip and not on the proposed site applied for. There are plenty of more suitable sites around the town I believe. Besides, who's buying houses at the moment? and this climate alone may be enough to put the said plan on the back burner. Then how financially viable to an investor is building a large hotel in a town that seems, is losing business.
Maybe it's time for Fermoy's more well healed citizens or co-operative thinkers to invest in the hospitality industry in the town, and maybe I'm talking through my hat! I can nearly hear you say. Local trades people should build it, both directly and if necessary with some back to work scheme. We need to be more insular in some of our approaches to finding a way of solving the problems that exist and the ones ahead.
It will be interesting to see who will get elected to the Council. I have not heard much from either McCarthy or Douglas. I must admit though I haven't been trawling the papers. I did take a look online at the Fermoy Town Council website and it looks like it's not been updated since 2004. If the council is not available in the 21st. century than maybe they should take it back to the beginnings of the State and put the bandstand in the town park to use. Rally it up people, lets hear the Thomas Kent Pipe Band on their anniversary and lets hear what these candidates have to say. Jaz maybe even some of the towns music hall of fame old and new would bang out a few tunes and make a day out of it. But only of course if the Council can afford to pay the relevant insurances with what's left over after the attendance budget of one conference or another.
I don't know how many council employed street cleaners are included in the 5K sum, but whatever they cost they earn their wage I'm sure.
I don't understand why Fermoy needs another hotel. There's the Grand, plenty of good quality B&Bs or holiday houses to rent. The Castlehyde and the Glanworth Mill hotels both closed, I assume due to lack of custom (I provided all of these places with custom when they were open except the Grand which is hugely overpriced). It appears to me that it's just an excuse for the developer to get planning for lots more houses that also aren't needed.
I'd just like to understand the reasons why Fermoy needs a big hotel.
Interview with Adam Douglas here:
Interview with Adam Douglas, Green Party Candidate for Fermoy Damien Mulley
According to Douglas, the big issues in Fermoy are parking charges, flood and traffic management and rising umemployment.
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