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Facilities demanded for Balbriggan

Thursday, 07 August 2008

A SUCCESSFUL meeting was held in Balbriggan recently to launch a campaign for community facilities in the town.
Garret Mullan, a local member of the Socialist Party, and Cllr Clare Daly (SP) convened the meeting and were joined by representatives of local organisations.
The meeting heard how Balbriggan has become the “forgotten” town and a full range of community facilities is badly needed.
Groups represented at the meeting included residents’ associations, Balbriggan Town Council, the local rugby club, Educate Together, Balbriggan Ar Aghaidh, Remember Us and concerned locals.
At present there are no community childcare facilities, full-time youth services, swimming pool, gym or public meeting spaces in the area.
Mr Mullan said the meeting was an encouraging start to a campaign to deliver facilities for Balbriggan.
“There is a strong feeling in the town that Balbriggan does not seem to feature on the map in terms of receipt of resources for community development,” he stated.
“That we had representation at this meeting from most of the significant groups in Balbriggan provides us with the opportunity to build a broad community campaign.
“More than 4,000 houses have been built in the area in the last five years, with no provision for necessary community facilities. This is not good enough and has to change.”
Mr Mullan said Fingal County Council needed to direct human and financial attention to Balbriggan, because it is truly the forgotten town.
“Some fantastic facilities have been built in other areas,” he argued.
“Finglas Leisure Centre, built and funded through the taxpayer, provides an excellent service with fully equipped gym, all-weather five-a-side pitches, swimming pool, community centre and youth resource service in an integrated venue next to the library. Why not in Balbriggan?”
Balbriggan Ar Aghaidh was commissioned by Fingal County Council to deliver a report to assess community needs in the area.
The report found that existing facilities in 2006 were used to their optimum and many groups had to make use of commercial resources or go outside Balbriggan.
Following the meeting, a petition was launched calling on all residents and groups to sign up to a demand for a multi-purpose community centre.
The petition will be circulated to groups and residents over the next few weeks and will be presented to the council at its next meeting in September.
Cllr Clare Daly and Balbriggan Town Councillor Larry Dunne (FG) agreed to forward the demands of the campaign group to the local authority.
A spokeswoman for Fingal County Council has outlined a number of measures to be introduced to improve community facilities.
“We acknowledge that the development of community facilities in Balbriggan has not happened at the pace we would have liked in recent years, in most cases due to circumstances outside the control of the council,” she told Northside People.
“Nonetheless, there are a number of real and firm commitments to developing important community facilities in the coming years.
“We are at an advanced stage in negotiations with O'Dwyer’s GAA Club with a view to providing one of the largest grants ever made by the council to develop community infrastructure in Fingal.
“Fingal County Council has also made a financial commitment of e0.75 million capital funding to assist in the development of a community swimming pool in Balrothery for the Balbriggan area.”
The spokeswoman said that the most important and significant community facilities to come on line in Balbriggan in the coming years would be delivered through the very successful Fingal Schools Model.
“Working closely with the Department of Education, we are very close to a finalised design for two new 16 classroom schools at Flemington,” she added.
“This will deliver a full scale community centre which should be open to the public in approximately two years.
“On an ongoing basis, Fingal County Council will continue its work with a wide variety of sports and community development groups throughout Balbriggan with key outside health and education agencies to ensure that community facilities are provided to meet the needs of all the residents.”

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