INDEPENDENT Ireland councillor Tommy Hartigan believes Limerick Mayor John Moran has great ideas, but maintains that often it’s the execution of these ideas that can be a challenge.
From the outside looking in at the machinations of Ireland’s first directly-elected Mayor, Cllr Hartigan is of the view that it can be hard for people to fathom the new structure of Limerick City and County Council.
“People have been used to the system that was previously in place. We haven’t seen a change like this in the political world in Ireland since the foundation of State, maybe the Constitution and the formation of the role of President. The first few presidents were kind of controversial as well,” the Adare-Rathkeale representative opined.
“You can imagine people in the past saying, ‘what is Douglas Hyde doing? What made him think that was okay?’ You have to try and form it, and I think John has good ideas for us. It’s the execution of them is the problem. But it all comes back to budgets, back to manpower and staff.”
Cllr Hartigan admits that he has also been quick to tell Mayor Moran when he felt he was making a mistake with some of his decisions over the first year of his term.
“There’s some of them where I just said to him, ‘I think that’s a terrible idea’,” the first-time councillor said.
One such “terrible idea”, Cllr Hartigan, maintains was the closure of a number of streets in the city to traffic last August, including The Crescent, to facilitate a large number of activities, including an inner-city urban beach, as well as live music, community events, and a large dinner party.
“I think that was a well-intentioned idea executed poorly. I believe the People’s Park would be a better option for it. I 100 per cent understand the idea, as over the last year I have spent a lot of time in the city and seen how that area is very transient.
“There’s really nothing there and I think what he was trying to do was put something together that would bring people together and project it in a positive light. I do think the park would have been an ideal location for it,” he adds.
The mayoral role, Cllr Hartigan points out, was a position voted for by the people of Limerick, and John Moran the man elected to fill that role. The government, he insists, must now get behind Limerick’s Mayor and make the role work.
“It is my job to support him as much as I can, not stand in his way, but to call him out when he does make a mistake. I suppose, be it right or be it wrong, I’m not really one to be sitting in the chamber screaming and shouting. I would rather pull him aside and say, ‘I think you dropped the ball’.”
– Local Democracy Reporting Scheme
