Vandals uproot Barefield’s Tidy efforts

BAREFIELD’S efforts for the Tidy Towns competition have been dealt a blow with vandals targeting their carefully planted flower arrangements in recent weeks.

 

Flowers planted in containers on the roundabouts leading to the M18 Ennis to Gort Bypass have been pulled out and thrown on the roadside with Sean Corcoran of the Barefield Tidy Towns committee saying, “It looks like they danced a hornpipe on them”.

Tyre marks have also been found with members of the committee believing cars have been used to damage the flowerbeds.

Gardaí have been contacted by the committee to investigate the vandalism. Mr Corcoran said the incidences first began a number of weeks ago. Since then, most weekends have seen the flowerbeds targeted under cover of darkness.

“The Tidy Towns committee was set up here in Barefield three years ago to help brighten up the village a bit. We’ve got great support from the community and we’ve been cleaning the margins, putting out hanging baskets and putting out concrete barrels for flowers. We thought the flower beds were looking really nice this year and then this happened.

“When it first started happening, we got Fr Jerry Carey to announce it from the altar but it happened again. Last weekend, sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning, the flowers were all pulled from the concrete barrels. Every flower was thrown out in the grass margin,” he said.

The committee have retrieved what they could from the removed flowers and began replanting what they can.

“We had €2,000 at the start of this year that was raised from bag-packing and table quizzes. We have only €100 left. We are all volunteers here and we’re bitterly disappointed that anyone could do this awful thing. It’s pure vandalism from young thugs.

Everyone should have a bit of respect for their village,” he said.

The committee are hopeful this setback will not have an adverse effect on their Tidy Towns score. However, Mr Corcoran said the image of the village is more important than the competition. “We don’t know when the judging is happening but it is usually is June and July. We were working away last night to try and make the flowers look good and we can only do our best. I presume the judges will understand. But we’re not out to win this, we re happy just to get a few points. The most important thing is to have the village looking nice.”

Anybody with any information about this is being asked to contact Ennis Garda Station on 065 6848100.