Campaign needed on park proposal

Campaign needed on park proposal

13 April 2016

PLANS for the regeneration of Ballynahinch’s Lough Park, which have been bedevilled by a series of delays, could be reignited with the backing of a cross-community campaign, according to a local politician.

Strangford SDLP Assembly election candidate Joe Boyle believes the £1m scheme to transform scrub land into new synthetic football pitch for Ballynahinch Olympic and other attractive features for the community still has a future.

Funding of £600,000 under the EU’s Peace III programme was lost as a result of delays, despite the deadline for spending the cash being extended, while the former Down Council allocated £400,000 for the ambitious project being spearheaded by the soccer club and Hillcrest Drive Community Partnership.

Mr Boyle said the huge response he received from people in Ballynahinch following his recent letter in the Down Recorder on the Lough Park issue has reinforced his view that people power is key to getting the planners to “see sense” on the development, claiming the community has been “cynically exploited by unaccountable civil servants.”

He said concerns he raised about the potential of “undue influence” being used across the decision making process for commercial reasons have struck a very significant chord and is a matter he is determined to unravel.

He also warned that unless “the strongest possible message” is delivered to planners and Newry, Mourne and Down Council, Ballynahinch will continue to be an increasingly marginalised area.

“We need to get across that the people of a town with so much potential will not take any more in terms of being discriminated against. The health and leisure benefits that are central to the Lough Park project would have had hugely positive spin-offs for generations to come. Instead, we are left in a planning limbo with a piece of waste scrub land instead of a signature scheme for the town,” the MLA declared.

“It is incredible that a project with so much social value was so close to being rubber-stamped on so many occasions only for it to collapse so close to the line. Some of the reasons put forward at the eleventh hour by faceless men in grey suits at Stormont raise very serious questions.  I would argue they can only be challenged properly within the confines of the protection provided by parliamentary privilege.”

Mr Boyle said a key part of the strategy to get the project back on track is a clear commitment from the local community to fight for what it was entitled to.

He added: “The reality is that the entire Lough Park debacle and the loss of £600,000 of vital community benefit cash sums up just how far Ballynahinch has fallen behind other towns of comparable population size. There is no doubt Ballynahinch was the poor relation in the context of the former Down Council when it came to getting a fair share of allocated resources. 

“In the context of the new council area boundaries, Ballynahinch is still expected to take the crumbs of the cash cake on offer, rather than a fair slice of investment cake. This is unacceptable.”