Campaign to redevelop old Mayo hat factory site

PEOPLE Before Profit local election candidate Joe Daly has called for the local community to join his newly launched campaign to have the old hat factory site in Castlebar redeveloped as a public amenity for the people of the town.

The hat factory was once an iconic building on the Newport Road in Castlebar, providing badly needed employment for local people for over 42 years from 1939. It closed in 1981 and since then, successive Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil led councils and governments have, he said, left the site to become 'a derelict eyesore'.

Said Mr. Daly: “I am calling on Mayo County Council to immediately begin the process to compulsory purchase the old hat factory site from the private owners and to redevelop the site as a public amenity.

“I believe the site should be used to provide a badly needed state of the art public preschool facility along with social housing for those on the housing waiting list of Mayo County Council.

“We are also demanding that local TDs in government parties make it an immediate priority to have the necessary funding provided to Mayo County Council from the huge budget surplus of nearly €10 billion in the coming year.”

Mr. Daly has created an online petition and he is asking the general public in Castlebar to sign and share it widely.

“If we can build a strong people powered campaign on this we might be successful and wouldn’t it be a great win for the local community,” he added.

The petition can be found at https://my.uplift.ie/petitions/the-hat-factory-campaign-castlebar.