West Clare

IN recent weeks, Kilrush Town Councillor Tom Clyne retired from his role as a FÁS job initiative worker in the town. The former town mayor, who was first elected to the local council in 2004, has worked in the position since 1998. As he remembers it, a significant amount of people were employed on the jobs initiative scheme 15 years ago. That figure has since drastically reduced. “There are about 10 people on the scheme in Kilrush at the moment. We have lost a lot of people through retirement or death in the last few years. I think there was 21 on the scheme in 1998,” Mr Clyne said this week. The Westmeath man, whose wife Breda is from Kilrush, worked primarily as a maintenance man on the scheme. “I was one of the people assigned to do the house maintenance for Kilrush Town Council, who were our sponsors. I was a general operative starting off but as we progressed, …

ALTHOUGH he has lived and worked in Nottingham since 1966, the love of golf Michael Rush picked up in his native Lahinch has had a profound effect on his life. Now almost 72, Michael or ‘Smiley’, which he says he is better known as, was the centre of attention at Lahinch Golf Club earlier this month when the exploits of the 1963 All-Ireland Junior Cup winning team were recalled at a golden anniversary celebration. Lahinch Golf Club won the same competition in 1961 but according to Michael, the cupboard has been bare since. “I wasn’t even in Clare in 1961, I was in London. My brother, Tommy, was part of the 1961 squad. He was a radio officer and he won a vital game but he had to go back to sea and he missed the last two rounds. When we had won it twice, you think, ‘this is easy enough’. You could think different now. Lahinch hasn’t won any …

MARK Glynn is acclimatising to life at UCD having traded Kilrush Community School for the prestigious third level campus. The 18-year-old Cappa man achieved stunning results in the leaving certificate, emerging with eight A1s and one A2. Mark, who has two sisters and a brother, was one of just nine students nation-wide to achieve similar results. Utilising his mathematical prowess to tot up his points tally, he realised that it sat at a maximum 625. Not surprisingly he sailed into medicine, his first-choice course. “I wasn’t expecting to get those results at all although I needed those points to get medicine,” the self deprecating student told The Clare Champion last week. Mark probably sensed that something was up when it was suggested that he stay around for a bit, on the day the leaving certificate results were distributed. “I went into the school at about 9.30am. They handed me the envelope. I was just told to wait back for a …

JASON Ryan has got to know almost every back road in West Clare in recent months. The Kilrush man, who is a retained fire fighter in the town, has been partaking in four hour early morning training stints as he prepares for a five day, 2,100km (1,350 miles) cycle around Ireland. The cycle starts at 3pm in Trim on Sunday and is due to last five days. Jason, who is fundraising for the West Clare Cancer Centre in Kilkee and the Clare 250 Cycle, is confident that he is in physical shape to cycle up to 500km daily. “I’ve been out most mornings, nearly every morning, for the last couple of months. I’ve been clocking up between 80 to 100km at least four mornings a week. When it was brighter I was heading out at 5 or 5.30am but for the last few weeks it has been about 6.30am,” he told The Clare Champion this week. Once he leaves his …

AT least 10 CCTV cameras will be erected in Kilrush town centre following the completion of a tendering and Part 8 planning process. At Tuesday’s September meeting of Kilrush Town Council, members unanimously backed the initiative, which was originally proposed by current town mayor, Councillor Paul Moroney. “What’s proposed is to have a number of cameras throughout the town. There’s a total of ten. Six of them are fixed at various locations throughout the town. Four of them are zoom cameras, which can move. The town centre is deemed an area of concern,” town clerk John Corry stated. “We’re going to have a fixed camera on the credit union and the Vodafone shop (subject to approval). There’s also going to be cameras on poles either side of the town hall. One will take in Moore Street, Francis Street and the square. The other one will take in Henry Street, John Street and Burton Street. We’re also going to have a …

MORE than five months after the National Famine Commemoration was held in Kilrush, local town councillors still cannot decide where to locate the commemorative sculpture. In fact, only one member of the public responded to a council invitation for suggestions as to where the sculpture by Paddy Murray should be installed. After a long debate at Tuesday’s Kilrush Town Council meeting, councillors decided to defer a definite decision until October. Some councillors admitted that the location issue has dragged on for so long they would struggle to recognise the sculpture if they saw it. “I’ve forgotten what it looks like and how big it is,” Councillor Ian Lynch said. “We don’t know what it looks like. Because of the plinth, we haven’t seen it all,” Councillor Mairéad O’Brien stated. Town clerk John Corry revealed that an invitation for submissions from the public, issued in July, was met with an under-whelming response. “I received one submission. The location that was identified …

THE Ché Guevara mural saga has taken yet another turn in Kilkee with retired pharmacist and former Kilkee Chamber secretary, John Williams, claiming the resort town is in the throes of rebellion. One complete and a second partially complete mural of Ché Guevara have been painted on the side of privately owned property in the town in recent days. This follows Clare County Council’s decision to remove a 20ft-high mural of the famous Argentine revolutionary from a ball alley wall at the West End of Kilkee beach last week. The image of Ché Guevara was part of the publicity for the annual Ché do Bheatha Festival in the town. The removal of that mural has led to an upsurge in mural creations in recent days. “It’s a rebellion after the high-handed way the council treated the town. It’s a rebellion as befits Ché Guevara,” a furious Mr Williams told The Clare Champion on Wednesday. He predicts several images of the …

KILKEE based community radio station, Raidio Corca Baiscinn has been granted funding from the latest round of the of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) Sound and Vision Scheme to make a documentary on The Clare Champion, which has been in existence since March 1903. Grants totalling €4.462m have been offered to broadcasters and independent producers to support the production of 102 radio and 17 TV projects. When completed, the funded projects will be broadcast by a range of community, commercial and public service broadcasters across the country. All of the projects being offered funding will explore the themes of Irish culture, heritage and experience. “We are thrilled about this as you can imagine, and I am really looking forward to getting started on it,” Derrick Lynch, Programme Co-ordinator with Raidio Corca Baiscinn, said.