Soccer club offers solution to controversial town park pitches plan

By JACQUELINE HOGGE THE controversial decision to proceed with placing all weather pitches in the Palace Grounds has been questioned by a Tuam sports group who say they could facilitate the development.[private] Tuam Celtic FC has queried why Galway County Council insist on locating the facility in the public park, when it has acquired planning permission for a similar facility on its grounds at Cloonthue. Last week it was revealed that a grant of €180,000 had been retained for the provision of two all weather pitches which were first mooted in 2008. The grant is conditional on the facility being located in the Palace Grounds, a stipulation that led both Tuam Town Council and the Tuam Electoral Area Councillors on Galway County Council rejecting the project. Club could provide Seamus Sweeney, a founder member of Tuam Celtic and youth development officer at the club, said if the money was redirected towards the club, it could provide the community with the sports facilities. 'We have obtained full planning permission for two, all-weather astro turf pitches but haven't been able to get funding to actually develop them,' he said. 'All sports capital grants were suspended when lottery funding was redirected towards the exchequer over the past two years and while we're hoping to avail of FAI funding to develop our community centre and gym, this council grant would allow us to develop pitches that would be open to the entire community.' The council's proposal to locate the pitches within the park is being progressed alongside plans to develop tennis and basketball courts, which are necessary to facilitate the development of Tuam's inner relief road. Tuam Town Council has rejected initial proposals to locate the six courts on a large area of green adjacent to Presentation College, which will have use of the complex, but alternative drawings are being worked on. However, Seamus Sweeney says if the pitches were sited at the soccer club's grounds, it would help to minimise the public fallout from the controversy. 'We have a membership of 400 that includes six different nationalities and we give our grounds over to the local schools who all have keys to the complex and can come and go as they please,' he said. 'It makes more sense to develop lands that are available than have these pitches next to a profit making organisation, when they could be on our lands and be part of what already is a community facility. 'We are in talks with the FAI to fund a community centre and gym that will cost in the region of €800,000 and if we could develop the all weather pitches alongside this, it could lead to the regeneration of the entire area.' In recent years the club had hoped to relocate its facility to a site at Gardenfield but failed to secure planning permission following objections by residents of the area. It is now focusing on the development of its Cloonthue site, where it owns ten acres. 'Gardenfield is out of the equation and all our efforts and energy is going into the ground at Cloonthue,' said Seamus. 'We already have quotes for what these pitches would cost but given we already have a lot of facilities in place, such as the lighting, we think we could get the job done for less than the €220,000 we have been quoted in the past. 'In fact we'd be confident that if the council would allocate the €180,000 they have for their pitches, we'd have the facility in place here without any of the fuss that's being caused down in the Park.'[/private]