Outrage as Wexford County Council ‘declares war’ on charity groups’ roadside posters

By Simon Bourke, Wexford People

Wexford County Council has “declared war” on community groups in the Rosslare district by removing signs advertising fundraising events without any prior warning. Earlier this month it was revealed that road crews from the council had taken down signs promoting events which, among others, were being held to raise money for cancer services.

And now, yet more signs have been removed in what has been described as phase two of a “blitzkrieg” of the Rosslare Municipal District (RMD).

Among the affected events were the Foulksmills Duck Race, The Phil Murphy Weekend, The Leo Carthy Weekend, The Bannow Rathangan Show, The Bow Tie Dip in the Nip (which raises money for mental health charity, It’s Good 2 Talk), The Taghmon Street Fest, and The Relay For Life (which raises money for The Irish Cancer Society).

Approximately 100 signs were removed by council staff and subsequently dumped in a council yard in Wexford town. And at the July meeting of the Rosslare Municipal District (RMD) Cllr Ger Carthy was in no doubt as to where the finger of blame should be pointed.

“These signs were unilaterally removed from the side of the road over the past ten days. There was a cull done on them,” he said. “This was ordered by the very same senior engineer who turned a blind eye to political posters everywhere; at roundabouts, junctions, flyovers, over speed limits signs. The crews from the Wexford Borough District were sent out to do a number on the different districts by the senior engineer.

“To be honest it’s very disappointing that the council would bring so much heat on itself, whatever about businesses, but to do this to charities? All these groups in the RMD are trying to make a few quid to improve the lot of the people in the county, and their signs were guillotined.”

Hoping for an explanation as to why the signs were taken down, Cllr Carthy said he had issued an invite to the senior engineer in question to attend the monthly meeting of the RMD but, to date, had not received a response. And he said the decision to remove so many signs, for so many events, left the council in a difficult position ahead of the Fleadh Cheoil next month.

“The Fleadh is coming in three weeks time and WCC can’t put up any signs for it. Because the people I represent aren’t going to be treated any differently to anyone else. There’ll be no Fleadh signs put up because there’s clearly a policy on these.”

Although the senior engineer was not in attendance, director of roads Eamonn Hore had issued a memo to councillors outlining the guidelines for advertising on public roads. His memo stated that “some of the recent signage was not in accordance with the guidelines and was causing a hazard, particularly at junctions”.

According to those guidelines, no signs should be erected less than 2.1m from the footpaths, 2.5m from cycle lanes, on any road under or over a bridge, within 2.5m of a roundabout, and should not interfere with sightlines at junctions or roundabouts.

Mindful of the upset caused to community groups across the district, Cllr Carthy’s thoughts turned to making amends, to attempting to issue an apology to the affected parties.

“How are we going to deal with the distress we’ve caused to these groups?” he asked. “Firstly, we’re going to have to issue an apology, we interfered with their property, threw it in a yard, told no-one and hoped it would go away. The signs are broken, damaged, this is one step short of criminal damage.”

Particularly galling, according to Cllr Jim Codd, was that many of the signs had been removed on Monday afternoon while he and his fellow councillors were at the county meeting of WCC discussing this very issue.

“Did we go to war with the community groups?” he asked. “Was war declared unbeknownst to me? Clearly there’s a culture clash in the council; some of our staff are brimming with common sense, but then we have others who abide by the letter of the law at all times and will nail you if you’re one inch to the left or the right.

"Whoever made this decision should be sent out with a sledgehammer to put the signs back. These groups are the lifeblood of the area, and while we were defending them on Monday the second stage of the blitzkrieg was taking place, the second phase of the war on our community groups was underway.

"If a sign is in the wrong place, and it’s a danger, no problem, take it down, and contact the group and explain what’s happened. At least tell them where the sign is.”

This war on the community just happened to coincide with an electrical outage which threatened to derail one of rural Wexford’s most anticipated events.

“Bear in mind the ESB, in its wisdom, decided to have a power cut on the day of the Bannow Rathnagan show, is there any joined-up thinking here?” asked Cllr Codd. “If it was a comedy you couldn’t write it.”

Although many of the events in question have now taken place, Cllr Carthy asked that those advertising upcoming events be reinstated. Furthermore, given that many groups reuse the signs on an annual basis, a request was made to return the remaining signs to the organisations in question.