€2.66 MILLION ALLOCATION FOR ROCKCORRY COMMUNITY PROJECT

The village of Rockcorry was in celebration on Friday evening when Minister for Rural and Community Development Heather Humphreys arrived with the news of a €2.66 million allocation to enable a long-held ambition for the construction of a new community facility in the area to be realised. Rockcorry was one of 12 successful applicants for support under the Community Centre Investment Fund operated by Minister Humphreys’ Department. The Minister made the national announcement in Newcastle in Galway on Saturday, but the evening before the people of Rockcorry were requested to assemble at their current community facility to learn about some “significant news” that Deputy Humphreys, who resides in the locality, was bringing with her from Dublin.

The anticipation was at fever pitch,, and all was eventually revealed when Minister Humphreys, with a flair for the dramatic, opened a large manila envelope with Oscar-like deliberation before revealing its contents to the audience – a card with the figure of €2,667,785 emblazoned on it. Added to match funding amassed through many local fund-raising initiatives, it will enable the construction on a site made available by the local GAA club of a multi-purpose community hub, a project whose planning started in 2016 but which encountered a series of obstacles including the Covid-19 pandemic, the complexities of Brexit and the steep recent rise in construction costs.

The chink of light which appeared when the Minister created the community centre-specific funding stream in her Department widened into a ray of hope with the development of a Vision Plan for the area and the agreement by Monaghan Co Council to come on board as the project’s lead partner. Ballybay-Clones Municipal District Cathaoirleach Councillor Sean Gilliland, who was accompanied by his Fine Gael colleague from the MD and Co Council Richard Truell, encouraged the community on Friday to make an application to the Municipal District …