Lights out sparks anger in chairman Cllr Keith Doyle

CHAIRMAN of the Enniscorthy Municipal District Keith Doyle blasted council officials last week for a degree of short-sightedness when it comes to spending money on features for the streets of the town.

Cllr Doyle asked Engineer Joanne Kehoe to take a look at the uplighting around the town. He said that uplighter street lighting in the likes of Slaney Street and Rafter Street was out in a number of places and that ‘for the sake of a dozen or so bulbs, it would make all the difference’.

Ms Kehoe replied that the uplighters had proved problematic in many areas around the county with water leaking into them being one problem.

‘Well why did we put them in in the first place then?’ shot back Cllr Doyle.

‘ They were put in historically all over the place,’ she replied. ‘Now it would seem that the quality wasn’t as good.’

‘Why do we always do this?’ Cllr Doyle asked. ‘It’s the same thing with the cobblelocking. We spent a fortune putting in cobblelocking all over the town and now we’re seeing that it’s not staying in place like it should have and we’re tearing it up and putting down tarmac. Why didn’t we just put down tarmac in the first place?

‘I’m not blaming you Joanne, but now we’re in this situation again where we’ve spent money on these lights and now a couple of years down the line we’re seeing that they’re not good enough and that they’re leaking water.’