Company seeks land rezoning to create 240 jobs

THE owner and managing director of a hugely successful Dungarvan company is promising up to 240 new jobs if Waterford County Council agrees to rezone his lands on the outskirts of the town.

The local Chamber Of Commerce is lending its full support to the rezoning proposal and will be seeking an early meeting with Waterford County Manager Ray O’Dwyer to discuss the matter.

Brian Shanley is MD of Shanley Electrical and Mechanical Contractors Ltd., a private company set up in Dungarvan 34 years ago.

It currently employs 108 people and has an annual turnover of €34 million.

In a letter to the nine elected members of Dungarvan Town Council Mr Shanley said he is seeking their support to have lands owned by him at Ballygagin on the outskirts of Dungarvan rezoned so that he can create a new Business Industrial Park.

“We have been in protracted negotiation with two prospective companies and are very confident that we can get them to locate to Ballygagin creating a possible 160 to 240 jobs in the area,” Mr Shanley said.

He added that a development of this kind will create an infrastructure that will allow them to attract new industry and help to sustain existing local companies.

Fine Gael Cllr Fred Forsey said the offer is a very attractive package.

“Dungarvan,” said Mr Forsey, “has suffered devastating job losses in recent years, including the closure of the Waterford Foods milk processing plant and more recently that of Waterford Crystal. The reverberations of those closures are still being felt locally and will continue to be for a very long time to come.”

Cllr Billy Kyne said that while the council would always be wholly supportive of any job creation initiative, in this instance the lands at Ballygagin are in the Waterford County Council jurisdiction and not Dungarvan Town Council.

“I would have thought the proposed developer would have first gone to the county manager to discuss his plans,” Mr Kyne said.

However the town council is to support the land rezoning proposal, and with the Chamber Of Commerce also coming on board the pressure will inevitably increase on the county council to clear the land to rezone the Ballygagin lands.