The Drogheda Independent was deploring the lack of "fresh, alternative political thinking" among the latest group of local election candidates.
"Few self-respecting Celtic Tigers who are fully paid up members of the `because I'm worth it generation' are going to spend 25 to 40 hours of their spare time on a voluntary job that will probably end up costing them money," it declared.
It might have had trouble convincing the Longford Leader, which reported that four councillors received £1,600 each for attending two meetings in 1999. The four are chairmen of strategic policy committees (SPCs), whose work has been delayed by industrial relations difficulties.
However, another aspect of the expenses story was presented by the Drogheda Independent's sister newspaper, the Fingal Independent. It used the Freedom of Information Act to reveal the expenses of Fingal county councillors during the period October 21st, 1998 to May 21st, 1999.
Mr Cathal Boland (Fine Gael) received a total of £17,115, including a cathaoirleach allowance of £7,693.07, travel of £2,916.69, home conferences of £3,327.03, monthly allowance of £2,941.96 and foreign conferences of £236.25.
"When you divide the number of hours by the expenses it's a joke," said Mr Boland, who puts in 60 hours per week on council business.
"There's a considerable anomaly perpetrated against us by central government in that members of the Dail have a vested interest in seeing that most people are not in a position to perform well in local government."
At the same time, he wasn't sure that a taxed "salary", like that which TDs receive, would be the proper way since "people on high incomes might make a gesture of not accepting it and hand it back".
Other councillors' expenses ranged between £2,000 and £7,000. Among the highest paid were Ms Joan Maher (FG) at £7,014.37; Ms Anne Devit (FG) at £6,134.9; and Mr Ken Farrell (Labour) at £6,764.44. Their figures included £3,000 expenses each for chairing SPCs.
"If you don't know a bank manager, you can't be a councillor," said Mr Cyril Gallaher (FF), who claimed £2,632.30 in monthly allowances.
The "country will be run by bullies and the rich" if the breaking of planning laws is not curbed by local authorities, warned Ms Maureen O'Carroll, a Tramore Town commissioner.
According to the Munster Express, she cited two "frightening" planning breaches in the resort and was backed up by her colleagues on Tramore County Council.
Cllr Pat O'Callaghan claimed that planning in Tramore had gone "haywire". The Seaside Resort Scheme, for which the town qualified, was supposed to develop tourist amenities but all that was built were houses and apartments.
With so much local development under scrutiny, a lack of development may be the next fashionable planning trend.
An absence of light pollution has made Mayo's ceide fields the ideal site for a new centre for astronomy, according to Mr Noel Treacy, the Minister for Science, Technology and Commerce.
At the launch of the Belderrig research and study centre last week, he was in full campaign swing as he told the Connaught Telegraph: "I am quite excited by the potential of Belderrig to become a research centre of international significance, not alone from the point of view of geology and archaeology, but also from an astronomical viewpoint."
Astronomer Mr John Fitzsimmons told the newspaper that astrophotography has become impossible at his current base, the largest telescope west of the Shannon at Carraroe, near Sligo town. He said this was because it was polluted by a string of low-pressure sodium lamps installed along the route of the new Sligo bypass.
The Donegal Democrat told of the "journey of healing" undertaken by a second World War airman.
Mr Jim Gilchrist (76), a widower, is the only living survivor of the 1944 Bluestack plane crash. Last week, he climbed the mountain into which he had crashed 55 years ago to unveil a plaque to Adrian Gallagher, who died in the Omagh bomb. Mr Gallagher had been involved with the erecting of the memorial to the airmen, never knowing that his own name would be inscribed on a plaque at that very spot.
Hate is bubbling to the surface on Shannonside, wrote Brendan Halligan of the Limerick Leader.
"The prospect of refugees settling on Shannonside automatically raises the spectre of racism in this region . . . Immigrants are not the problem. Natives are, or rather a tiny minority of them.
"Further evidence emerged only this week when a young woman resident was insulted in a Limerick street in a manner so filthy I shall not repeat it in print. . . . How could she remain so Christ-like in the face of such provocation?"
"You get used to it," she said with a sad smile.