Blackrock Bulletin

Local Tidy Towns committees get ready for competition season

The physical preparations have begun in earnest, but the formal process of applying to enter the national contest is a task in itself and quite a big one that both Blackrock and Haggardstown groups are engaged in at present.

Applications have to be in by May 10 and are a detailed process that entails a lot of knowhow to provide the judges with the information they require and in the proper format.

Not least it is time consuming and a certain aptitude and experience is helpful.Turning to the physical side of preparations, the local Blackrock group have adopted an approach that they have employed for years to get the village looking as splendid as possible for the judges when they come to carry out their adjudication.

It is a Weekly Action Hours programme.

The programme entails members and all volunteers who would like to join them meeting up once a week to spend an hour sprucing up the village, cleaning and tidying and doing work to enhance the appearance of the village.

The committee started this year’s lead into the national competition on Monday night by assembling at the sun dial on Main Street to undertake different projects in the village.

Anybody free and with an interest is invited to join the group which will convene every Monday night for the foreseeable future at the same point. It will not alone provide helpers with a sense of satisfaction in assisting to prepare and make their local environment look better and nicer in which to live, but the opportunity of a relaxing social opportunity to meet neighbours and even make new friends and acquaintances.

‘Do a little’

To encourage involvement by all in the Tidy Towns effort and engender pride in the area the committee have coined a motto to get all villagers to play their part.

The message and request is quite simple and is not asking much. It is: “Do a little outside your door and a little bit more.”

It is something that most can do without much thought or exertion. The overall impact is obvious and will make a big difference to lighten the work in getting the village ready and more importantly make the village a much more attractive place to live.

“It will make the job much easier (for regular volunteers and helpers to get the village in shape),” a Tidy Towns spokesman pointed out.

Entrance features

The Tidy Towns group are in a race against time to complete two projects that will help impress the judges and all visiting the village this summer.

They are to renovate and refurbish two entrance features to the village, but have only till the end of this month to carry out the work.

This is the condition on which they have been granted funding which they applied for only recently to upgrade the entrance features at the Loakers and the Greengates on the opposite end of the village, where the shrub and flower beds will be replaced.

They also were successful in obtaining funding to replace refuse bins on the residential/shop side of the Main Street.

Tree planting goals

WUXI and Haggardstown Tidy Towns group are looking to take their collaboration a step further in their common goal to improve the appearance of the local community.

Wuxi staff, accompanied by children, took part recently in the Tidy Towns spring clean event as part of the plant’s contribution to Earth Week.

Come September, it was suggested that the two groups get together again and carry out some tree planting in the area.

Gers Lotto update and latest results

THE jackpot in the Geraldines lottery has increased again and is now €6,800. This followed after it was not won last week when the numbers drawn were: 10, 12, 17 and 28.

Two players selected three numbers to share the €200 prize. They were Alan Thornton and Dermot Rogers.