Council officials meet with IT Carlow
A MEETING between high ranking officials within Wexford County
Council and representatives of IT
Carlow took place on Friday afternoon with a view towards moving closer towards the procurement of a new site to house the college’s long awaited new Wexford Campus.
It is understood that the meeting saw council officials offer any assistance they can to get the project over the line and get a shovel in the ground. The council had previously submitted a host of potential sites for the campus to the college’s Board of Management and
Friday’s meeting took the form of a frank discussion on the future of the project.
Last week, in a letter sent to all staff members and students at the Wexford Campus, the college fired back at local representatives for publicly admonishing the institute in its approach to a new Wexford campus, stating that the institute remains committed to Wexford as they have been for the past 25 years.
Director of Services at Wexford County Council Tony Larkin revealed at last week’s Wexford County Council meeting that the meeting with IT Carlow representatives was planned to take place, in response to a request for an update from Cllr George Lawlor, who has been one of the college’s biggest critics.
‘Have we any advance on the situation with IT Carlow?’ asked Cllr Lawlor. ‘I was disappointed to read recently a headline in the Kerryman newspaper proclaiming “University Town Tralee”. It was written into the programme for government back in the day that a technological university would be set up in the South East specifically. Now we’re continually being passed by by others. For whatever reason the two bodies (IT Carlow and Waterford IT) are not bonding. It seems to be a case of a tuppence looking down on a penny.’
When Cllr Lawlor stated that IT Carlow representatives had refused to discuss the situation in the council chamber, Mr Larkin clarified that there was a delay in sending out the invitation and that the relevant parties only received the letters the day after the meeting had taken place.
Speaking ahead of the meeting, Mr Larkin said: ‘I hope that we can make progress and try to push on with this project. I’m very happy that they’ve agreed to come and meet us and we hope to be able to propose some solutions to push this on. I share the concerns of the members in relation to technical universities across the country, but the primary focus for now is to get the new campus sorted for Wexford.’
‘I’d welcome that this meeting is going to take place,’ said Cllr Lawlor. ‘You’ll have to excuse my scepticism. It’s been five years since the money was sanctioned for this campus to go ahead. Can we urge IT Carlow to put a timescale on this? I’m sure there are other colleges we could be talking to about setting up a campus here if this doesn’t come to pass.’