The Friday View 17/02
Heritage returns to the city centre, the minutiae of council meetings and our weekly round-up of news and events.
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Once a month, usually on the first or second Monday, Cork City Council convenes an “ordinary” meeting, which brings together elected councillors, city council staff, the CEO and the council executive (the senior management team in City Hall) in the chambers at City Hall.
I’ve been following and reporting on these ordinary meetings since I moved back to Cork from Japan. During the pandemic, the meetings were held over Zoom and viewable to all. Post-pandemic Cork City Council continue to livestream the meetings and you can drop by the City Council’s YouTube channel on a Monday evening and see how democracy unfolds at a local level. (The recordings are not available to view post meeting but we publish a story with the most newsworthy events on T+D).
At a base level the meetings are quotidian; everything from dog fouling to parking discs and pot holes is up for discussion and debate. In fact, some of these particular issues crop up in meeting after meeting, which suggests two things: our solutions are not working, and these are the issues that residents and citizens are engaging their councillors with.
The meetings are long: they start at 5:30pm with a roll call and a prayer and usually stretch past the four hour mark. Because there’s so much to be discussed the agenda is the holy grail and guiding north star to use a few cliched terms. That agenda is agreed in advance; councillors table questions, and this gives council staff time to come back with answers and information. The sitting Lord Mayor chairs the meeting, and she’s flanked by the CEO (Ann Doherty) from the council executive.
The councillors are plugging their party ideologies and the views of the people who elected them, or at least contacted them. They all know each other and for the most part proceedings are respectful and good natured. For the most part. As the meeting and the night wears on, you can see the energy drain, especially as some councillors are more verbose than others. They’re all part-time politicians; they’re certainly not in the position for the money. More likely they’re guided by a sense of civic duty, and a belief in their own politics (the independents) or their party politics. (And let’s be honest, ego plays a part too).
What the meetings also reveal are the limits of local democracy: the councillors can table questions and vote on motions, but often what’s happening on the ground in Cork, as with the ongoing works by Irish Water, is decided way above and beyond the level of local politics. But that doesn’t take away from what is arguably the most important function of these meetings, a forum for elected representatives to put checks and balances on the bureaucrats who oversee how our city functions.
-JJ
News in brief
Details of a new large scale sculpture trail were announced this week. Called Island City, the sculpture trail will unfold in different locations across the city centre and will run from June through to December of this year. The trail will comprise of five art works at various sites located between both channels of the River Lee - hence the name Island City. The public sculptures will be installed at Carey’s Lane, Cornmarket Street, Cook Street, Princes Street with the final location and artist to be decided in an open commission.
Art and culture (and food) is definitely one way that city centres can compete with suburban-based shopping centres and outlet centres which divert people (and money) away from the city centre. With free parking, everything under one roof and most importantly easy access to vital public utilities such as toilets, what shopping centres lack in charm they make up for in infrastructure. Bottom line: art and culture matter, but so too do public utilities.
Women and politics: Beginning this month, Cork City Council will hold a series of lectures, workshops and training sessions designed to increase the number of women running for elections in Cork. While there are currently 31 sitting councillors in the city, only six are women. At a national level, women make up 23% of the Dáil. At a county level, Cork has only one female TD.
To wit, ‘More Women for Election in Cork’ which the City Council is running in conjunction with Women for Election, a non profit based in Dublin. It’s aimed at tackling the gender imbalance in local and national politics. The full list of workshops and seminars is available here as well as details on how to sign up.
Back in the big league: Cork City FC return to top flight action when they take on Bohemians at Turners Cross later today. The club has a new owner, Dermot Usher and a new shirt sponsor and a raft of new signings. City have come a long way since our long read in 2021; beleaguered was probably the most apt adjective to describe the team and the atmosphere back then. But, City have since turned it around and are back playing top flight football as of today (where they belong as no doubt their supporters would say). In an interview this week with The 42.ie, the new owner said he’d be happy with a top five finish. He also said he’s investing in toilets at Turners Cross! Tonight’s game and the next few games will give some indication as to how realistic a top five finish is. The game kicks off at 7:30pm and will be shown on RTÉ 2.
Tweet of the week
Beara-based author and conservationist Eoghan Dalton shared this tweet earlier this week having finished restoring ‘Dreamline’ by sculptor Seamus Murphy. The sculpture was first placed in Fitzgerald’s Park in 1977, but following the restoration will now move indoors to Cork Public Museum.
Out +About
🎻H’up! UCC TradFest kicked off earlier in the week and will continue until Sunday, February 19. Tonight the flagship Battle of the Bands will take place at An Spailpín Fánach followed by a concert featuring Conor Kane and Rebecca McCarthy Kent. On Saturday (18/2) there will be a charity session in aid of the Ashling Murphy memorial fund at the Abbey Tavern. Back up at UCC in the Devere Hall on Saturday night (18/2), Tara Breen, Jim Murray, and Pádraig Rynne will take to the stage with support from the winners of the Battle of the Bands. Tickets and more information for that gig here.
Time, date, place: Various venues until Sunday 19 February
👖Swap: There’ll be a clothes swap in Bandon Town Hall this coming Saturday (18/2). A few house rules: maximum of 10 items and all items should be clean and in good enough condition to wear. Shoes are OK, but no undergarments or swimwear. More information here.
Date, time, place: 11am-3pm, Saturday 18 February, Bandon Town Hall P72 E448
🖼Gallery tours: The Crawford Art Gallery offers free tours every Thursday and Sunday. The 45-minute-ish tour winds its way through the gallery and along the way you’ll get to know more about the Crawford collection as well as their temporary exhibitions.
Time, date, place: Thursdays, 6:30 pm and Sundays 2pm, Crawford Art Gallery, Emmet Place
📸Place, a new photography exhibition opened this week at MTU’s gallery on Grand Parade, later than planned owing to the cyber attack on the university. The exhibition features the work of “photo citizens” documenting their hometowns throughout the world and runs February 24. More details here.
Time, date, place: 11am - 4pm Monday to Friday, until February 24, MTU Gallery at 46 Grand Parade
This week on T+D
On Monday, Fionn Lichtsinn Doyle, our first intern at T+D, wrote about the fate of a 250-year-old beech tree in Kinsale. The ancient tree in the grounds of Kinsale Outdoor Education Centre was set for felling last week, but under protest from locals, the insurance company has agreed to further assessments. Full story below.
On Tuesday, JJ summarised some of the main events from the city council’s monthly meeting. One item of good news is that after years of neglect the council sent a team to look at what can be done to save the ‘hut’, the landmark small building which served generations of bus drivers and firefighters.
On Wednesday, we published a news piece on two well-known buildings that have been boarded up for years. The listed warehouses on Parnell Place were sold by the City Council to Tetrarch Capital, a developer based in Dublin in 2017. Tetrarch applied and was granted planning permission to build a budget hotel in 2018. What’s happened since? Read on.
That’s it for this week’s Friday View. We’re back tomorrow with a long read and on Sunday with our Arts+Culture newsletter. Any tips, news or events you’d like to share with Tripe+Drisheen, you can contact us via our About page here. We are always happy to speak to people off the record in the first instance, and we will treat your information with confidence and sensitivity. Get in touch