Major service cuts as Cork Council plugs €4m gap caused by Covid

City Hall is looking at swingeing cuts to street cleaning, footpath renewal, estate resurfacing, and traffic calming budgets. Picture: Rory Coomey

Significant cuts to services are on the cards as Cork’s city councillors try to plug a €4m hole in the city’s finances caused by the pandemic.

Street cleaning, footpath renewal, estate resurfacing, and traffic calming budgets are all facing swingeing cuts following a dramatic drop in the council’s income.

Some public parks could be closed temporarily, Tidy Towns funding may be axed, and there are warnings that some cuts may leave the city unable to mount a court defence to legal challenges to parking fines next year or pass Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) audits which could open the city to the risk of fines, councillors have been warned.

The scale of the pandemic’s impact on the finances of Ireland’s second city has emerged in recent days as councillors engaged with officials in pre-budget talks.

Apart from the loss in commercial rates, which is to be covered by the State, the council has seen a collapse in its regular income streams, including parking charges, landfill fees, planning application fees, and concert hall fees.

It has led to a forensic trawl of almost every spending code in the area of non-pay discretionary spending, which identified around 500 possible cuts.

They were discussed by members of the city council’s finance and estimates committee last night.

One document details 39 possible cuts totalling some €1.6m to the city’s operations budget alone and spells out the impact such cuts would have on services, including warnings that:

• Cuts to the abandoned cars service could see it run out of money by the middle of next year, meaning that no more abandoned cars would be removed until 2022;
• There would be no upgrade of ICT systems to deliver an enhanced parking phone system, an electronic appeals system, or a virtual residents permit system;
• A proposed €10,000 cut in the civic amenity site budget could see some services close, including the collection of paint, solvents, and dangerous substances;
• A €38,000 cut from a street cleaning budget would reduce the frequency of mechanical street sweeping in the city, and end chewing gum removal work;
• The Japanese knotweed eradication programme would be suspended, there would be no funding for dog fouling awareness, and tree pruning services would be slashed by 50%;
• A possible €85,000 cut to a security budget could lead to an increase in anti-social behaviour in public parks and may lead to some parks being temporarily closed or opening hours being restricted.

Independent councillor Ken O’Flynn said the scale of the financial challenge is stark, and he called on central Government to provide emergency funding.

“In the area of road, footpath, and tree maintenance alone, cutting these budgets could open the city to a barrage of legal claims as opportunists seek to fleece the city,” said Mr O’Flynn.

A meeting to strike the rate of the city’s local property tax is due to take place next week.