Mixed reaction to consultants report
THE Council needs to hire extra revenue collectors, create an asset development masterplan to harness the inherent value in their properties and sites, renegotiate their debts with the Government and consider selling and leasing back public owned buildings.
They’re some of the recommendations made by a KPMG Report commissioned by the Council and discussed at the December meeting last week.
Councillor Declan Bree described some of the “transformational” projects mentioned in the report as coming straight from “the Thatcherite school of economics.”
“The only recommendation omitted is a proposal to buy lottery tickets every week in the hope that a win might clear some of the debt,” he added.
“Maggie Thatcher wouldn’t come up with some of this. I don’t want to be associated with it,” he said.
Cllr Hubert Keaney criticised the lack of consultation with members by KPMG consultants. Cllr Joe Queenan questioned the value of the report, which at ¤60,000 was “handy money” for the firm.
Chief Executive Ciarán Hayes said the report was brought before a Corporate Policy meeting last August and insisted that there was no way of knowing for sure that their rate income would rise if they upped their collection rate.
“The reality is, that nobody but nobody can argue with the figures we’ve produced over the last four years,” he said. He said the KPMG report backed up the Council’s assertion that they can’t “make inputs into the ¤21m deficit.”
He said the report would back him up in future negotiations with the Department over the Financial Plan which was now “outdated” and “not relevant in our era of growth and the positive announcements for Sligo.”
Cllr Queenan said the Council would not be able to pay the deficit of ¤21m and said whoever is elected as councillors next year will “have to look at” raising the Local Property Tax.”
Cllr Michael Clarke felt the Council had “no alternative” but to commission the report. “It affirms what we’ve been doing,” he said.
Cllr Bree said he’ ll be proposing in January to bring the Chief Executive of Leitrim County Council into the chamber to find out how he’s collecting rates and Ciarán Hayes could “listen and learn.”
The Chief Executive insisted the KPMG report gave him the wherewithal to “put it in front of the Department and say ‘ there’s the argument for Sligo.”
Cathaoirleach Cllr Martin Baker said there was also an onus on members to try to get the “rent money up.”
“We have people knocking down our doors looking for homes...we have a certain responsibility there,” he said.
Cllr Rosaleen O’Grady said “sometimes you have to speculate to accumulate” and she felt the KPMG report was a good bargaining tool.
Cllr Margaret Gormley said she hoped that the Department would see the “dire straits this Council is in.” Cllr Paul Taylor said the cost of the report was the major issue for him but he hoped the Council would learn from it and move on.