Save Kilkenny might save all our skins yet
Feel free to kick yourself if you didn't support the objections to the Kilkenny Central Access Scheme. This is where it was always leading it turns out:
For those who couldn't make the Public Save Kilkenny meeting, this is the gist of the situation. I've also sent this on as a letter to the editors of the Mail on Sunday - as they were great at scaring the ACS off Kilkenny's animals. Now its the people to be screwed by the Council …and for the foreseeable future.
Kilkenny County Council voted to give away the main sites on the Brewery Site on Wednesday of this week. It is no longer a 'heritage site' with archeology to be explored, it is an 'industrial site' requiring a 2metre slab of concrete over it….if this is not what you want please read on and do something about it before it is officially passed!!
No social element
ISA fund
of 7.5 billion from Europe has been extremely difficult for the
government to spend as it has such a strict financial criteria. The proviso is
that a commercial return is required. The problem is that it rules out
education, cooperatives in fact any social enterprises.
David Fitzgerald is seen below on his video
saying that the people of Kilkenny bought the Brewery site with a view to the
proud moment of building a university there.
The corruption: Joe Crocket was county
manager, signed off on the CAS (the contested motorway bridge to the site) and
then immediately took up a post with the NTMA (with whom this week’s
partnership was made) to hand over the site to!
Banned from Regulating Businesses on Site
It would hand over Kilkenny City to
corporate interests in every sense. The council will not even be able to veto
harmful businesses who want to be there on planning grounds, environmental
grounds, business grounds or on social grounds. Planning objections would be no
car parking for office blocks, moral objections would be incoming businesses
doing R&D on dubious substances – pharmaceutical, military and computer
advancements being the only research that can be said to make money. It was explicitly
said that there will be ‘no social element to the education and research’. Environmental
objections would be that they have a 2m slab of concrete over the whole acreage
as they say the land is so toxified. They only want buildings that can be put
on piles built there but the piles will still be breaching this barrier. Business
objections would include that there are already over 100 empty units in
Kilkenny and social objections would be that Kilkenny County Council intend to
make a ‘teenage hangout’ under the new flyover, in contrast to the
three-pronged commitment made at the
Public Participation meeting.
1.
Environmental Excellence
2.
Integration with the City Scape
3.
Operated by Kilkenny County
Council for the benefit of the people
Structure of Agreement between NTMA, KCC and Abbey Quarter Ltd
The structure of the agreement voted in on
Wednsday is that Kilkenny County Council
form a limited liability partnership with NTMA and they collectively
form another company Abbey Quarter Limited who will be ‘General Partner’. The site
will pass into the hands of this General Partner and the council will be
statutorily banned from involvement. However the liability of 4.75 million
falls to us the people of Kilkenny to GET THE SITE READY FOR THE PRIVATE
COMPANY TO SELL TO OTHERS. We will not
benefit from any part. In fact the liability does not stop there. Going
forward? Council money will be used to maintain roads, services, designs,
archeology, development and planning.
In the past, they were talking about a
‘Heritage Site’ (Its on the Medieval Mile in Kilkenny) and trying to work out
how to do a reverent archeological survey before repurposing the site. Now they
are calling an ‘Industrial Site’ with massive levels of toxicity that prohibit
anything less than a 2metre slap on the top. It is highly suspicious as a good
way to avoid doing the archeology required. They talk about PCBs and Asbestos
but actually Diageo who did have the brewery left because of the dual
carriageway bridge proposal. They said it would contaminate their water and
product. This makes it more likely that they had a managed environmental policy
and the council are just justifying glossing over the historical site.
Review The Local Government Act, reduce the power of the executive
Save Kilkenny have asked for two things
‘The Local government Act’ be looked at
again and changed as the Council Executive are running riot - in every council, forgetting that they work
for the people in a public office and holding the purse strings and far too
much power. They are not voted in and they do not have the moral foundation to
govern any community matters. They are manipulating the elected representatives
to agree to the decisions the executive have made already. Last week’s meeting
about the Brewery site was conducted in secret, which is inappropriate. One
councilor said that what was shared then was of concern but that now, this
week, they felt fine about the whole thing and had voted it in.
The vote should have been deferred to
Friday, following the Save Kilkenny meeting to explain the long and difficult
details and implications of giving the site away and expose the contradictory
information that they have been fed but the majority voted the partnership in
anyway.
The implications for the people are that we
still own the brewery site at the moment but if this vote is validated, we will
no longer own it and will be paying for the services to those who do for the
rest of time, even if they put our own businesses out of business. Furthermore,
Kilkenny County Council have committed themselves to selling off further assets
to pay for this. We will end up with less than nothing and no regulatory powers
over anyone that does come.
A Judicial Review of The Voting System
where none of the voters had full information in Advance
The absurdity and betrayal of the people is
blatant. Where last year they screwed the animals of Kilkenny, this year they
have in mind to ruin every last person too.
Oh yes, except for Joe Crockett and a few others perhaps who must be
enjoying some part of the deal.
The second thing Save Kilkenny called for
at the public meeting was a judicial review of the agreement between Kilkenny
County Council and the NTMA. They breached various rules we know of already,
for example that every person to vote must have a full document and information
about the agreement that they’re to vote on a full 10 days before it goes to
vote. That did not happen. And I am sure there are countless more
infringements.
Please expose the situation or flag it up
like you did about the ACS exploiting our horses and dogs. We’ve got to stop it
before the 6 of the 9 sites change hands into Abbey Quarter Limited. By then it
will be too late.
Very best regards,
Frances Micklem
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