Galway City Council rows back on parking permits refusal
Galway City Tribune - City centre residents were wrongly refused parking permits on the basis that they had driveways outside their homes, Galway City Council has conceded.
Chief Executive of the Council, Brendan McGrath, has put his hands up and taken responsibility for the debacle, where around three dozen people were refused permit renewals.
“The buck stops with me,” said Mr McGrath, as he confirmed that the local authority has now rowed-back on the unofficial policy of not issuing permits to residents with driveways, following uproar from elected members, who were lobbied by angry members of the public.
Mr McGrath said the local authority has re-issued permits to anyone with driveways who were initially refused permits due to a new interpretation of parking bylaws.
The reason some people haven’t yet been re-issued permits is because they haven’t reapplied, he said. If and when they do re-apply, the permits will be granted, Mr McGrath promised.
He made the comments during some tetchy exchanges at a special meeting of Galway City Council held on Monday.
The one-item agenda special meeting was called after 13 councillors signed a ‘Section 140 Motion’ – this is a rarely-used power of elected members to compel City Managers to do something.
The motion, proposed by Cllr Collette Connolly (Ind), and seconded by Cllr Ollie Crowe (FF), said: “The following councillors call on the Chief Executive under Section 140 of the Local Government Act 2001 to end the current practice of the Executive to refuse parking permits to residents in Claddagh on the basis that they have a driveway”. This is a preview only. To read the rest of this article, see this week's Galway City Tribune. Buy a digital edition of this week's paper here, or download the app for Android or iPhone.