The substantial document has been in gestation for almost one year, and will be circulated to local councillors, TDs and senators before a high stakes meeting scheduled next week.
Next Friday, Cathaoirleach of County Galway, David Collins (FG ), and the Galway city manager, Leonard Cleary, will preside over a special joint session of Galway city and county councils’ Corporate Policy Groups in County Hall, attended by Oireachtas members from across Galway, to ratify this submission, which seeks a more equitable financing of the city, compared to similar civic authorities.
In its simplest form, the €6.7 billion shared among the republic’s 31 local authorities is decided on an opaque calculation based on population, area, local road network length, priority projects and Pobal’s social deprivation index.
Galway city, with few residents within its jurisdiction, a tiny area, short road network and no neighbourhoods experiencing extreme poverty, therefore receives the lowest baseline funding nationally. It is the only authority on the western seaboard to send more tax income to Dublin than it receives in return allocation from the nationally decided Local Government Fund (LGF ).
Galway City Council’s new business case for Government will include a costed proposal to change the council’s overall funding structure, upgrade its tiering status, seek extra financial support for national infrastructure – including the Ring Road and expansion of Galway Port – and seek legislative reinforcement to facilitate a pilot bed night tax for tourists.
Cleary, who has spearheaded a drive to upgrade Galway city since his appointment last year, with support from the city council’s elected members, said funding a city with an archaic calculation partially reliant on road distances does not seem appropriate for a compact, regional capital of European status.
He said: “There is no difference between a mile of road in – say – Leitrim, than there is in Galway, except here it carries more massive multiples of traffic, and may serve 2.7 million individuals each year. This is an antiquated criterion [for financing] a regional economic driver, and we should be funded accurately and accordingly.”
