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Crunch meeting to save Plaza
08.01.08
Story: Inishowen Independent
A MAKE or break meeting has been called for tomorrow
night to discuss the future of Buncrana’s Plaza
Project. The voluntary project encompasses a dance
hall/exhibition space and proposes to establish an
‘indoor street’ – a café style space for teenagers
to socialise in a safe and alcohol free environment.
However, the project has been bedevilled by a lack
of funding, opposition from neighbours and apathy
from the local community. |
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“Despite applying for
funding from local, county, national and European
sources, we’ve drawn an absolute blank,” said
project secretary Cathleen Doherty. “The only
funding we have ever received was a small
feasibility grant from Inishowen Rural Development
Limited. There doesn’t seem to be any will to invest
in teen facilities in this |
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part of the country.”
In November secondary school students across the
country participated in the Big Ballot that sought
to determine what was important to them. A large
majority of students at Crana College identified the
lack of play, leisure and recreation facilities
locally as the most pressing issue facing them.
“Sports facilities in the locality are top notch and
a credit to all those involved, but for children
that don’t participate in sport there’s nothing for
them to do or nowhere for them to go,” Doherty said.
Shareholders and investors will meet tomorrow night
to discuss the future of the project, but Doherty is
pessimistic.
“It seems we’re not far from the end of the road,”
she said. “There has been a desperate lack of
community support and continuing is becoming
increasingly untenable.”
The building has a mortgage of more than €900,000,
two-thirds of which is overdue. Plans to clear the
mortgage by accessing grants have fallen through.
Cathleen Doherty is at a loss as to why funding
applications have failed, but says that the
innovative indoor street type approach is entirely
new and funding bodies do not seem to be able to
deal with something that falls outside of their
previous experience. Repeated delays in obtaining a
dance licence have also hampered the development of
the project with objections being repeatedly heard
in the District Court. “The opposition has been a
nightmare,” said Doherty, who has worked on the
project in a voluntary capacity since 2002.
“We have successfully held two Chamber of Commerce
trade fairs, a number of art exhibitions and boxing
tournaments, but the project has been badly hampered
in recent years.” |
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