What do you really think of your County Council ?..

Paddy20

I must admit that I am very disillusioned with my Local Authority. They seem to be operating their own private elitist dictatorial enclave, with a ' We ain't answerable to anyone attitude ' .

I believe they are answerable to you and me, but people are afraid to challenge them.

Donegal County Council ignore 'Public petitions' expressing the views of the electorate, they file them away, and hope the public will give up complaining about whatever the petition was about !.. even though it is just about the only legal means of protest left to Joe Public. :mad:

What do you think about your Local Authority, is it democratic ?..

I am thoroughly 'Pissed off' with mine.

P. :cool:

Civilian_Target

Donegal County Council are ****ing useless. Letterkenny Town Council aren't quite as bad - they do at least respond when lampposts need fixed or theres a pile of puke on the pavement, and they keep the place pretty tidy.

I found Fingal County Council to be a damn sight better though - I reported an oil spillage on a roundabout and they came and cleaned it within 2 hours. I emailed them compaining that a kerb onto a cycle lane was unsurmountably high and it was lowered within 6 weeks.

That said - on an international scale the corruption here isn't *that* bad - it hasn't got to the point where its accepted by the general public as part of everyday life. I sent a parcel to a friend in Macedonia on Thursday, and then texted her to tell her I'd sent it, and how I'd marked it, so that she can bribe the postman to ensure it arrives intact.

muffler

This could be "entrapment" If I put down in writing what I thought about DCC I would probably have my ass sued or chewed

Seriously, I dont think they are as bad as people make out. Every establishment such as County Councils, Health Boards, Government Depts. etc are always wide open to criticism with most of it justified.

Depending how you look at it but political input or interference is part and parcel of the Council. After all we voted the members on to the Council. I, like a lot of people, could write a book about the Council including the members and officials but I think that people are very quick to condemn but not as quick to give praise.

jimmeh

The construction of a roundabout on the ramelton road in letterkenny that has been ongoing for over a year is terrible, if it were in the north it would be done within a week.

Paddy20

muffler wrote:

This could be "entrapment" If I put down in writing what I thought about DCC I would probably have my ass sued or chewed

I thought the WWW, was the -new frontier- of freedom of expression, where we could openly speak out, and tell 'The Ugly Truth' as we saw it, without fear or favour and away from the real world of litigation lunacy ?....

P. :cool:

muffler

I thought the WWW, was the -new frontier- of freedom of expression, where we could openly speak out, and tell 'The Ugly Truth' as we saw it, without fear or favour and away from the real world of litigation lunacy ?....

P. :cool:[/QUOTE]

Far from it Paddy. You have the right to remain silent (cant see you doing that though) Anything you say can and may be used in evidence against you in a court of law. If you not wish to say anything.... if you do not have an attorney one will be ...... etc etc etc.

Believe it or not if you post something here it has the same legal status as if you wrote a letter to a newspaper and it was published without being edited.
Just think of some of your own posts Paddy. Do you really think that any newspaper would publish them. Not likely.

That is why you may see some posts edited. Freedom of speech is all very fine and well but --- accusations made without any form of proof = libel and slander = serious trouble.

I read an article recently published by IBEC stating that about 70% of employees were unaware that emails had the same legal status as letters/invoices/receipts. The example they give was for a worker from any particular company/firm to issue an invoice or quotation thinking it would be alright to change it when it would be sent by ordinary post believing that anything sent via the World Wide Web was not legal and binding.

You have been warned so be careful out there

muffler

See now what you done Paddy. I fell for it again. I'll get a one week ban for posting "off topic"

Paddy20

Show me the proof , where it states that posts on WWW forums (Not E-Mails) are the same legally as a letter.

I do NOT believe it ?... Yes, a bit 'off topic' but relevant all the same, and vitally important to what appears in posts on forums on Boards.ie.

P. :cool:

Civilian_Target

Everything you post here is kept forever and will be legally binding upon you for the rest of your life Paddy. In fact, you can expect it to become more legally binding as you get older. As long as they can confirm your identify in real life, that's all that's required for anything to become legally binding upon you. And those pictures of yourself you posted will probably do nicely...

R0ot

Im not all that fond of the county council, once in buncrana just outside the Convent Secondary School there were 12 council workers, 2 digging a hole and 10 others standing around watching (True Story) But if your talking about the administrative side of the DCC then they are just as bad. Get absolutley no work done whatsoever.

muffler

Paddy20 wrote:

Show me the proof , where it states that posts on WWW forums (Not E-Mails) are the same legally as a letter.

I do NOT believe it ?... Yes, a bit 'off topic' but relevant all the same, and vitally important to what appears in posts on forums on Boards.ie.

P. :cool:

You'll want spoon fed next Paddy.

Check it out yourself as I'm a bit surprised that you did not realise this yourself

If you will keep digging that hole Paddy it is going to get deeper and going to be a "hole" lot harder to get out of.

As I said be careful out there

nanook

a post is a post, a post is your thoughts and it is you who have made the post.

anything you put in writing is your thoughts and opinions, the expression live by the sword then die by the sword comes to mind.

I lovethe fact taht we have a legal system that states Innocent untill proven guilty, as we all know that is not the case, many a man has had to spend years to clear themselves from charges they faced.

I am not saying that people should not post but they shold be careful on what they say as it will come back to haunt them

Nanook


PS this is the last off topic comment, anything after this gets a 1 week ban

byte

Civilian_Target wrote:

Donegal County Council are ****ing useless. Letterkenny Town Council aren't quite as bad - they do at least respond when lampposts need fixed

Pity they can't fix some of the lights on those islands between Hospital Roundabout and Pramerica.

Paddy20

You know that big roundabout by the Hotel & Petrol station where you can turn off for Derry or Lifford or Stranorlar etc .

Well ever since they built that horrible 'archway thingy' on the central grass mound that blocks everyone's clear view of all of the roundabout, I have a 'Bee in my bonnet' about it.

I think it is against road regulations to build on central reservations on roundabouts, as it restricts your view of all the other traffic using the roundabout, thereby causing unneccessary danger to road users.

When I learnt to drive over 40 years ago, while in the UK. I am sure that the only thing allowed on roundabout central reservations, were short floral arrangements that could not restrict your view, and I still believe that is all that should be allowed today, as the roads are dangerous enough :eek: .

P. :cool:

muffler

a sledgehammer would cure that

muffler

byte wrote:

Pity they can't fix some of the lights on those islands between Hospital Roundabout and Pramerica.

noticed quite a few of these out in different towns. I would love to know what the Council's policy is in relation to maintaining illuminated central reservation signage

byte

muffler wrote:

noticed quite a few of these out in different towns. I would love to know what the Council's policy is in relation to maintaining illuminated central reservation signage

Probably just the wait-until-somebody-crashes policy!

muffler

A true story. Have to shorten it unforunately and so it wont have the full effect but this really happened.

Back in the mid or late 70's all the windows on the ground floor of the County House were blocked with wrought iron bars bedded into the sills for security purposes. One of the senior engineers was requested by the County Manager to prepare a report on the condition of all the Council buildings in Lifford.
Part 1 of this engineer's report was sent to the manager marked urgent. If a fire started or a bomb was planted (common enough in those days) there was no secondry way out for either the staff or public as all the windows had bars in them.

Good management dictates that job delegation is the only way to get things done so the manager, acting on the engineers advice, instructs the County Secretary to arrange to have the bars removed from 2 of the windows so as they could be used as an emergancy escape route if the need arose. The secretary passes this to the housing engineer who passes it along to a clerk of works who dispaches 2 tradesmen to remove the offending bars. The tradesmen chisel them out and not knowing what to do with them they leave them lying on the ground below the windows.

Back to the report and a couple of days later. Part 2 of this report contained a very long list of faults and repairs needed around the various buildings - holes in the lino on the stairs, door handles missing, an odd pane of glass broke, doors sticking, broken wash basins etc etc. Once again job delegation is the order of the day so the manager instructs the secretary to arrange to have these repairs carried out. The secretary passes this on to the housing engineer who passes it to a clerk of works who dispaches 2 different tradesmen with the instructions to go around the buildings and fix whatever they seen that needed fixing.

On travelling around the back of the County House the 2 men noticed that the bars were missing from 2 of the windows. This needed fixing so the duly cemented them back in to the window sills.

Thats a true story and sorry if it was a bit long winded but I hope you all enjoy it. And there was a price to pay for this charade. I wont say who suffered or how

byte

LOL! So stupid, it's funny!

Martyr

Some here may know about the new pub in ballymacool?
Well, there is only one..

There was a story about the licence required to run a pub sought by the original owner, but was denied by the council.
is this true?

nanook

Average Joe wrote:

Some here may know about the new pub in ballymacool?
Well, there is only one..

There was a story about the licence required to run a pub sought by the original owner, but was denied by the council.
is this true?

joe, please expand, there is alot of things that can go qrong with the application of a pub license.
was the license being transfered to another area, ie was the origional pub outside ballymacool etc

Martyr

Somebody told me, ..and yeah, it is 'hear say'

this guy built a pub in ballymacool, but he couldn't get licence to sell alcohol,
so he sold the place to a guy, who happens to have brother in town council.

soon after the sale, the building was opened as a pub.

thats about it really.

nanook

what is the story with the license, did the origional owner have the a license, up untill recently you could not apply for a license and you could not transfer a license outside of the judicial juristriction.

Maybe this facts could be a consideration.
People are not going to state that they made a huge fcuk up on the applicaton of a building of their buisness. no one admits to bad project management

roykeane16

they are a crowd off lazy greedy good4 nothing junketing p20 they should remenber that you and I pay their wages

Glazun

yea.. it's more of a case, if you know the council, the council helps you. an retired member of the council, near where I live, suddenly got a PERFECT stretch of street, nicely tarred, the lot, before that it's crap.. ¬_¬ All though over time the whole thing is crap now. But what's with they're new road building frenzy? I wouldn't mind, but all these roads they build their fecking ****e. Seriously, they fall appart after 2 weeks. then they come back.. and fill in each pothole.. and, if you study them, they don't ACTUALLY do anything, beside my school, they're broadening the road, and continously, there seems to be people standing around talking, leaning on shovels..

Meh, the whole council idea is incredibly stupid.. imo they shouldn't have so much power, I mean ,why do they vote on who the next president is? O_o

muffler

Glazun wrote:

there seems to be people standing around talking, leaning on shovels..

They are not just do nothing

---

they are breast feeding the shovels

roykeane16

well here in manorhamilton they have started digging up the road again4 the 20th time at least in the last year its between the beepark and mullins filling station they aredigging up 4at least the 5th time this year when i asked a cuncil worker what the were doing his reply was sorry sir we cant comment on council matters ring the cc offices to find out he said ................... not the council workers i mean the useless lazy councilers i mean

Glazun

You know they'd save a ton of money if they just used a good type of tar.. and made sturdy roads.. that last, rather then having to continously employ people to fix the same stretches of roads.. And is it just me, or are they widening streets, then suddenly, the road narrows again, because they couldn't get the land?

Martyr

roykeane16 wrote:

well here in manorhamilton they have started digging up the road again4 the 20th time at least in the last year its between the beepark and mullins filling station they aredigging up 4at least the 5th time this year when i asked a cuncil worker what the were doing his reply was sorry sir we cant comment on council matters ring the cc offices to find out he said ................... not the council workers i mean the useless lazy councilers i mean

Would it be possible under the freedom of information act, to visit council offices and view details of any current work being undertaken by them?

I've seen it done in other countries that enforce the act, why not here?

I'm quoting a piece from Irish Independent, and i think its relevant to this thread,
its about corruption in waterford county council.

One official has been accused of passing on sensitive information to developers in return for bribes. Accusations have also been made against another official.

The allegations are understood to date back a number of years and involve millions of euros, according to a report yesterday.

It was also claimed that certain officials have been enjoying luxury holidays and have been in receipt of large amounts of cash in return for doing favours.

I'd say its going on in most councils.
Donegal council only employ people they know well..no outsiders.
Why is that?

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/index.php3?issue_id=12448

you have to register to view article.

muffler

Average Joe wrote:

Would it be possible under the freedom of information act, to visit council offices and view details of any current work being undertaken by them?

I'd say its going on in most councils.
Donegal council only employ people they know well..no outsiders.
Why is that?

Im fairly sure you can access details of their works.If you have to see or check something just give them a call in advance. For most works they intend to do nowadays they have to get planning permission for them the same as the private individuals.

Its a bit of a joke really that they apply to themselves for permission but that is a government regulation and not a local one. To be fair though I do know of several cases where permission has been refused.

I wouldnt agree entirely with the comment regarding the council employing only people they know. They are no different than the health boards, esb, eircom, bus eireann, an post etc whereby employess can get promoted up through the ranks and outsiders are ....well, kept outside. But there are a lot of cases where staff are recruited from all corners of Ireland

roykeane16

not sure aj might try it as the concil offices in manor are across the road form where i live