Council allocates €150,000 for toddler area at Castlerea Swimming Pool
Fianna Fail Councillor Paschal Fitzmaurice at Castlerea Swimming Pool where improvement works will be carried out on the toddler pool.. Pic. Liam Reynolds
Funding of €150,000 to carry out improvement works on the toddler pool at Castlerea Swimming Pool has been made available by Roscommon County Council.
The funding was approved at a recent council meeting as part of the council’s €75.4 million budget for 2024.
Under the budget, €80,000 was allocated for the maintenance and operation of the Castlerea pool in 2024 and to operate the pool for the 12-week summer season.
During the meeting, Director of Finance Sean Mullarkey gave an outline of the council’s capital programme.
“We have €2.5 million to spend to finish the Castlerea Food Hub and Monksland Remote Working Hub. The Castlerea Hub is going to finish early in 2024,” he said. “The Monksland Hub will be coming in probably in quarter two in 2024. There are significant interest in both buildings and I think it is a great move for the council to be involved in the projects.”
He added that €1 million was also set aside for Áras an Chontae's energy upgrade in order to make the building carbon neutral. It will involve solar panels on the roof and changing the lighting to LED.
A total of €3m was also budgeted for the new Civil Defence building, and a further €6.5m for Boyle Library, which Mr Mullarkey described as another big boost to Boyle.
“It is really highlighting that there is a lot of money coming into Boyle at the moment,” he said.
According to the council’s budget, a multi-disciplinary design team has been appointed to progress the project. It is expected that a tender for the construction of the library will be published in late 2024. A further €50,000 was also provided for the replacement of the council's library van.
There were also a myriad of public realm projects, Mr Mullarkey added, with a total budget of €20 million. This funding came through the Town and Village Renewal, the Urban and Rural Regeneration (URDF), and the Outdoor Recreation schemes. The funding is for projects in Roscommon Town, Ballaghaderreen, Boyle, Monksland and Strokestown.
In terms of burial grounds, €300,000 was allocated for the upgrades and extensions, which are planned at various locations throughout the county over three years. The priority for 2024 is an extension to Four Roads Cemetery.
One million euro has also been set aside for the An Bealach project in Ballaghaderreen. The council said this project would provide for a “Creative Entrepreneurship and Education Hub on a greenfield site which has been provided by the local community in Ballaghaderreen”.
“This creative hub will provide the western region with a collaborative work environment incorporating a mixture of dedicated and shared/open plan workspaces of 1,765 sq.m (19,000 sq.ft) together with visual creation + co-creation spaces volume LED studio with 700 sq.m (7535 sq.ft) capacity. The latter will be the only such studio in Ireland,” the council’s budget document said.
The three-year capital programme, 2024 to 2026, has a budget of €405.8 million and includes the massive €249 million for the N5 Ballaghaderreen to Scramogue Road Project.
