A round-up of today's other regional news stories in brief
Ennis hospital development plan lodged
Plans for the long-anticipated €40 million redevelopment of Ennis General Hospital were yesterday lodged with Ennis Town Council - seven years after the project was first announced, writes Gordon Deegan.
According to documentation lodged by the Health Service Executive (HSE), the plan will increase the number of beds on the hospital site from 140 overnight beds to 168.
The plans state the redevelopment of the hospital site is the first phase of a two-phase development that will result in 186 beds.
The hospital was built in the 1930s as an 80-bed hospital and the plans lodged seek permission for a new two-storey extension incorporating a new A&E, radiology and out-patient facilities at ground floor level, new medical wards and a surgical ward at first-floor level.
The plans also include a new day theatre at first- floor level to provide a new daycare unit and the refurbishment of the southwest wing of the existing main hospital building to provide new-day care unit facilities with a four-storey central block.
A decision on the planning application is due later this year.
Postmaster gets jail sentence
A postmaster who conned €14,000 from the Department of Agriculture has been sentenced to three months in jail, but has also been told it may be suspended.
Judge John O'Hagan imposed a series of three- month concurrent prison sentences on several sample fraud and postal offences on Eunan O'Donnell (65), who was postmaster at Kilraine post office, Glenties.
He adjourned the case to the next sitting in July to see if O'Donnell's application to work on a community scheme is accepted. The judge added that he intended suspending the sentences.
O'Donnell admitted 15 sample charges from 113 preferred against him at an earlier hearing. He intercepted cheques for sheep headage payments from the department, which were addressed to a neighbour.
The scam operated from April 1992 to December 2003. He claimed sheep headage payments in the name of a neighbour, Tony Scott, then opened the envelopes with the cheques and cashed them as they passed through his post office. Mr Scott never saw the payments.
O'Donnell said he did not think he was doing wrong in making claims in the other man's name as he paid him a share of the profits at the end of the year.
UCC honours Frank O'Connor
Cork-born writer Frank O'Connor has been honoured at University College Cork with the launch of the "Frank O'Connor Web Pages", a specially commissioned resource celebrating the work and life of the writer.
Harriet O'Donovan Sheehy, wife of the late writer, approached UCC's Boole Library and requested that the archives service co-ordinate what is to be the official Frank O'Connor website. Academics, both national and international, were invited to add content to the site.
The website, www.frankoconnor.ie, contains images from family collections not seen in public before now.