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As an accountant I understand that difficult choices have to be made in a budget, which is why I have always supported it.
Lick my decals off, baby!
atest press release from Cllr Derek Mitchell, issued on Thursday, November 18th 2021…
atest press release from Cllr Derek Mitchell, issued on Thursday, November 18th 2021…
Wicklow County Council will be holding its Annual Budget meeting on the 29th of November and for the first time in 20 years as a councillor, I will not be supporting it.
Wicklow County Council will be holding its Annual Budget meeting on the 29th of November and for the first time in 20 years as a councillor, I will not be supporting it.The budgets for Wicklow’s other district areas – Arklow, Wicklow, Bray – are €9m each, whilst Greystones’ is €4.5m.
The population of each area is similar. Each other area has 2 or 3 times as many staff. Yet the Local Property Tax income is highest in Greystones due to higher house prices.
Once again, it’s being used as a cash cow by the rest of the County.
Also the Chief Executive’s report shows that less than 2% of the County Capital spend is actually spent in Greystones, which has 18% of the population.
As an accountant I understand that difficult choices have to be made in a budget, which is why I have always supported it. 
After 5 years of asking for proper funding for Greystones, last year the Chief Executive made it worse with the area getting the least increase of any.
After 5 years of asking for proper funding for Greystones, This results in the ludicrous situation of a €50,000 street sweeper being kept in the depot because there are no staff to drive it!
The area is expanding fast and a lot of work is needed to cope.
Which makes it all the more disappointing that the Wicklow County Council Budget is yet again not fit for purpose.
You can check out Greystones being shafted by WCC fecks in 2020 here and 2019 here and our development levies being led astray here.
Wicklow County Council Spend Per District NOV21 Derek Mitchell