Cork County Council makes third application for flood repair funding
Yesterday’s meeting of the local authority heard how the council applied for €156,000 of funding from the Department of Environment, Community and Local Government, which has made provision for some €18m to tackle the fallout from the storms that hit the country over the winter.
Deputy county manager Declan Daly told the meeting that the recent claim follows submissions for €135,226 which has been paid to the council, and €1.427m which has yet to be recouped.
A letter from the department told the council that its request for funding to fix damaged roads should be addressed to the Department of Transport.
Fianna Fáil councillor Seamus McGrath was critical of the amount of funds paid to the council so far: “That seems quite a miniscule amount of money considering the enormous work required to restore the roads and other infrastructure, and so far we have only scratched the surface of what is needed to bring our infrastructure back to some sort of normality.”
Independent councillor Noel Collins queried when the appointment of a consultant to review flooding in Midleton would take place, and highlighted extensive flooding of Lauriston estate in the town. Residents were evacuated when the area flooded in December.
Mr Daly said that Midleton would be the subject of a “fundamental review” by the council and the Office of Public Works.
“Clearly Lauriston and the adjoining areas were significantly impacted by the floods that took place,” he said. “It’s important to understand the source of those floods. We hadn’t previously experienced floods of that nature in Lauriston and it is important that we undertake a proper analysis to understand the cause of that.
“This is a relatively new phenomenon, an unfortunate impact and it will require analysis before we do works, so we know what the best approach is in response to these issues. We are aware of the huge impact of what took place in Midleton and we will be doing all we can to address those into the future.”
The department also responded to the council’s call for emergency legislation to allow for the cleaning and dredging of waterways by instructing the local authority to address the request to the Office of Public Works.
The department said such legislation is a matter for the OPW as it is responsible for flood mitigation measures.
