West Clare

FINE Gael town councillor Liam Williams was elected Mayor of Kilrush at last Thursday’s Kilrush Town Council AGM.

CLARE County Council expects the Irish Water Safety Association risk assessment of the beach in Kilkee, including the possible health and safety dangers posed by diving boards in the West End and ladders throughout the resort, to be available next week.

AN Irish Water Safety Association (IWSA) safety audit is expected to take place before the end of this week at Newfoundout, West End in Kilkee, where two diving boards and two ladders were removed at the Pollock Holes last week by Clare County Council. A further three ladders were removed from three separate locations; Burns Cove, Edmonds Point and Georges Head. The decision, which was taken by Kilkee town manager Nora Kaye, was revealed at last Monday week’s meeting of Kilkee Town Council under ‘Any Other Business’. The decision was met with impassioned opposition in Kilkee. The decision was made on health and safety and insurance grounds but the diving boards and ladders were hastily put back in place late last week, when the IWSA told Clare County Council that it would be impossible to conduct a health and safety audit if the boards and ladders were not re-installed. In a statement issued late last week, Nora Kaye said that …

KILRUSH town councillors have urged the council executive to set realistic prices for perspective buyers of council houses in the town. At last Thursday’s June meeting of the town council, Councillor Liam O’Looney said that people feel part of a community if they own rather than rent their house. “The council should set a realistic market value. Tenants have more ownership when they buy a house,” Councillor O’Looney said. “In the last two housing estates that we’ve built, take-up has been very, very poor,” he suggested. However, Kilrush town clerk John Corry said that the local authority do seek an independent valuation for houses and that purchasers are entitled to appeal the price set up the council. He explained that Kilrush Town Council already has a Tenant Purchase Agreement in place, although councillors felt that the prices set under this scheme were prohibitive. “We’re going nowhere, as we are, with the scheme at the moment,” Councillor O’Looney claimed. Councillor Tom …

TWELVE months ago, Kilrush cyclist Paul Edson peddled from Dublin to Paris to mark his recovery from prostate cancer.

A NEW visitors’ website, www.visitmilltownmalbay.ie will be launched by Harry Hughes, administrative director of Scoil Samhraidh Willie Clancy, at a céilí mór and dance in the community hall, Miltown Malbay, on Saturday at 9.30pm.

STUDENTS at Querrin National School have recently become an official Coastcare group. The school has signed up to the national network of 121 other Coastcare groups. This project fits in very well with the school’s strong environmental ethos.

THE development of a useful index to the manuscripts of the 1930s Schools’ Folklore Collection from national schools in the West Clare area was an ambitious enterprise undertaken by TY pupils at St Joseph’s Secondary School, Spanish Point.