Tributes to late colleague Conal Praise for Tinahely champs
CLLR Vincent Blake led the congratulations to Tinahely GAA Club after its ladies won the Intermediate and Senior Championships last weekend.
St Pat’s defeated AGB in the Junior Championships, while Tinahely beat St Nicholas in the Intermediate final and St Pat’s in the Seniors.
Cllr Blake, a native of Tinahely, said: ‘It was a great day in Aughrim. St Pats won the junior final but my home team of Tinahely won the Intermediates and Seniors. Commiserations to the other teams who lost. St Pat’s are a great team and their day will come. I think Tinahely have won six titles in seven years which is a great achievement.’
Cllr Gail Dunne also attended the finals held in Aughrim and was full of praise for the St Pat’s efforts.
‘It was a great crowd. St Pat’s juniors won.
‘ The senior team are a very young group of girls, pretty much the side who won the Feile 2014, and their day will come. They are a very talented side. It was a great day all-round in Aughrim.’ COUNCILLORS from across the county and representing all political groupings paid tribute to the late former Councillor Conal Kavanagh at Monday’s meeting of at Wicklow County Council.
Cllr John Ryan remembered Conal as a fellow councillor for a number of years as well as a work colleague at ‘Great Place to Work.’
‘I spent a lot of time with him both as a councillor and at our place of work. He was a fantastic colleague and though we were from different parties, I always found him fair.
‘He served the people of Wicklow town and the people of County Wicklow with great diligence,’ said Cllr Ryan.
‘We worked together at ‘Great Place to Work’ and we have had a constant flow of emails and calls from people talking about how great his input had been. He had immense knowledge of HR. I can’t express the shock the company has been going through since we got the news.’
He also passed on his sympathies to the Kavanagh family, noting that they had been ‘amazingly strong in the past week.’
Cllr Gail Dunne had known Conal since they attended primary school together.
‘I really got to know him well at Wicklow County Council,’ said Cllr Dunne.
‘He worked hard and was great company. He loved to talk sport, whether it was GAA, golf or rugby. Wicklow town has lost one of the good ones. He was a good friend.’
Cllr Tom Fortune praised him for the calm manner in which he conducted
Cllr Sylvester Bourke said: ‘We varied it in the past over a wind farm three or four years ago. It’s frustrating that our powers have been stymied. Perhaps we could get a working group together to come up with a variation, with the best will of the council executive.’
Cllr Pat Kennedy said: ‘We were told that the county development plan was our plan, the plan of the people. Surely to God then we should be able to improve this plan. And it’s not just Donegal who have brought in a distance. Other counties are doing it as well. We are trying to put something in that the people want.’
Cllr Steven Matthews said it was his understanding that the Development Plan had to comply with national planning guidelines.
‘We have certain energy standards and I was told that we can’t have standards that vary from county to county.’ himself during sometimes heated council debates.
‘Politics can be very combative. Conal had a quiet persona and could make his point without being as combative as some of us. I had the privilege to serve alongside him for nine years. Four weeks ago I met Conal and Kiara at a wedding. We met him again the following day and he was about to head off to France for a holiday. I was extremely shocked then when I got the news of his passing.’
On behalf of the Sinn Fein group, Cllr Nicola Lawless passed on her sympathies.
‘I never had the pleasure of working with him but I have heard great things.’
Cllr Christopher Fox said: ‘I had the privilege of serving for ten years with him. The Kavanagh family have made a huge contribution to public life, both in County Wicklow and nationally.
‘Conal always offered an opinion here in the council chamber that people wanted to listen to,’ said Cllr Fox.
Cllr Mary Kavanagh said: ‘as a youngster growing up here in Wicklow we were lucky enough to have a TD from here and a Minister in Liam Kavanagh. It was great to see Conal following in the family tradition. The whole town of Wicklow was shocked and upset when the news started coming through.’
Cllr Pat Fitzgerald also praised the former Labour Councillor.
‘I worked two offices away from him for a time. I always found him to be a proper gentleman. He gave so much advice to so many people. He was always cool, calm
Cllr Vincent Blake sad there was a big difference between some of the smaller wind turbines from years ago compared to the large-scale projects now being sought.
‘I live close to what was one of the first wind farms at that point in time. But it was on the landowners own land and was nowhere near the size of nowadays. What we are seeing now is industrialised wind farms with international companies getting involved.’
Acting Council Chief Executive, Des O’Brien, agreed to seek a second legal opinion and would also inquire further about the Donegal case. However, he warned that raising the development levies on wind farms wouldn’t be feasible legally.
‘Development levies have to be proportional to the size of the development. They may need use of our roads to build the wind farms but after that they don’t use much of our services at all.’ and collected. Like I said, a true gentleman,’ said Cllr Fitzgerald.
Cllr John Snell served alongside Conal from 2009 to 2014.
‘I found him to be a no-nonsense type of public representative. He was born into politics, from Jim Everett to his father Liam. Conal was the voice of reason many times when he was here in the council chamber,’ said Cllr Snell.
Wicklow County Council cathaoirleach, Cllr Edward Timmins started life as a Councillor at the same time as Conal in 2004.
‘He was a very clever, incisive and practical man. At meetings he often gave an angle on things that the rest of us never thought of.’
The elected members also expressed their sympathies toward Cllr Brendan Thornhill over the loss of his mother in Cork.
Cllr Thornhill thanked everyone for their kind words, in particular singling out the councillors who travelled to Skibbereen for the funeral.