In spite of the decision of Galway city
council last week to sanction a road through Terryland Forest Park and to allow
building construction on a meadow in Merlin Park Woods, local environmental and
community campaigners have agreed to work with City Hall on developing a series
of eco-initiatives under the banner of its status as the European Green Leaf
City for 2017.
According to Brendan Smith of the Terryland
Forest Park Alliance, “At the annual plenary meeting this week of the Galway
City Community Network which represents over one hundred community and
volunteers organisations, there was a deep sense of anger and betrayal
expressed by many speakers over last week’s decisions by Galway City Council to
ignore their own long standing environmental, social and health polices as
contained in previous and current development plans as well as the advice of its
own consultants’ report in order to sanction road and building construction in
such sensitive green areas as Terryland Forest Park. It was a slap on the faces of the thousands of volunteers
who have given their time and energies free of charge since 2000 to create
woods, meadows, nature trails and other wildlife habitats. Combined with confirmation
at a meeting in City Hall a few days ago that officials have, for what they
call budgetary constraints, pulled the plug on the multi-sectoral Terryland steering
committee that includes representatives from the HSE, GMIT, NUI Galway and
schools, last week was a dark week for the local environmental and community
movement. Our vision of creating a
network of linked forests and natural heritage areas that would make Galway the
envy of the rest of Ireland was dealt a mortal blow from those we considered
our partners.
Yet it was unanimously agreed to warmly
welcome the long overdue appointment of a coordinator for the Green Leaf City
2017. Sharon Carroll, who will take up her appointment full time on January 1st,
is very well respected amongst the city’s community, schools and environmental
sectors especially for her work in a previous role as the city's Environmental Education
Officer.
For the sake of the health of present and
future generations and to enhance biodiversity in our city, we intend to actively
collaborate with Sharon on developing an ambitious eco-programme that we hope
will include the Outdoor Classroom, the Outdoor Laboratory, neighbourhood
organic gardens, nature walking trails, a proper collection facility for
hazardous waste, greater public access to and staffing of local authority parks
as well as securing significant citizens’ involvement in the management and planning
of our urban green spaces.
However we will continue our campaigns to
reverse the recent decisions of City Hall to pass death sentences on some of the
city’s major woodlands. In the case of Terryland we are considering bringing
the issue to the European Commission as we feel that the proposed road
construction is in contravention of the terms that the EU funding was granted
for this park in the late 1990s."
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