“With great power comes great responsibility.” These wise words to a young Spider-Man from his Uncle Ben are sure to ring true for Limerick’s, excuse me, Ireland’s, first ever directly-elected mayor.
As 2024 comes to a close, Mayor John Moran is now seven months into his new role, and probably contemplating where he goes from here as we head into a new year.
Moran, the people’s mayor, has impressed in his short time in office. The energy on the streets of Limerick felt charged, rife with possibility, during the summer months after his election.
Outside the slippery world of politics, there was always the opinion, particularly in the business community, that if a mayor was to succeed and deliver us a better and bolder future, there was only one person with the skillset to make that happen. If that’s the case, Limerick got their man, yet the discontent amongst local councillors has arrived at Shakespearean levels since the former Wall Street lawyer’s very first public meeting with them.
The main parties – Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael – seem to have decided from day one that they will not work with Limerick’s elected first citizen. Were they that sure it would be one of their own in office?
The old guard are not used to sharing the toys with anyone down in Merchants Quay, and now that there’s a new boy getting his picture in the papers every week and ‘taking credit’ for things that were previously in their precious realm, there is a near civil war from the civil war parties.
They are all singing off the same hymn sheet at Council meetings, and it’s time they changed their tune, if you ask me.
2025 is looming. Put the petty differences aside and work together with our mayor for the greater good of Limerick. That’s why the very idea of a directly-elected mayor held such appeal with the electorate to begin with. People want Limerick put first, not party politics.
The Mayor’s carrion call went out to the people of Limerick at his inauguration this summer at St Michael’s Cathedral, an occasion marked with a sense of history and huge expectation.
“On June 7, in ways that pleased me so much personally, Limerick not only voted for change, it also united as one Limerick. With a resounding message to a world which is too often drawn to division, Limerick declared it sees its own strength in its diversity,” Mayor Moran said.
“Let those who try to sow division in our society hear that message clearly. Limerick voted for a vision of one Limerick and a Limerick which will include everyone, rural and urban, as well as new and old communities right across the entire county.”
Dressed in ceremonial robes and led by a pipe band, vowing to serve all of the people of Limerick to the best of his ability, it was hard not to get caught up in the fervour. The ‘different kind of energy’, as the Council’s marketing gurus would call it, in the air since his election was palpable.
But, alas, the party poopers would be having none of all that.
‘Under pressure’
Just days after the historic inauguration, after partaking in a practice that dates back to 1765, as he performed the ‘dropping the dart’ into the choppy waters of the River Shannon, the gleam was about to come off Moran’s novel shindig.
At the very first meeting of the Metropolitan District, the Mayor took the proverbial bull by the reins and made it clear that things would be done his way. The former Finance Department General Secretary insisted he wanted everyone’s involvement in his grand vision for Limerick’s future.
However many around the Council chamber were breathless at the notion of having to give him ideas for Limerick’s future by the first full local authority meeting the following week.
“You are putting us under pressure already during our holiday time and during our work schedule,” Fianna Fáil councillor Kieran O’Hanlon suggested.
And before the Mayor could well and truly take flight, his wings were clipped. The call went out at the first meeting of Limerick’s newly elected 41 representatives for it to be abandoned. It was a fractious meeting that truly saw the fecal matter hit the fan.
During the business of the day, Fine Gael councillor John Sheahan nominated councillors Olivia O’Sullivan, Joe Leddin, and Fergus Kilcoyne to the board of Innovate Limerick when the item came up on the agenda. In days of yore, nobody would bat an eyelid at such a move. Not anymore.
Mayor Moran told Council members he felt the way board members are appointed is not necessarily consistent with governance code for State agencies. He explained that he was trying to find a middle ground to that as the shareholder of Limerick City and County Council.
“It is the prerogative of the shareholder to choose directors that can best serve that company. In order to do that, I think it is appropriate that we actually take into account the skills of the various people. They should only serve on those boards if they can bring specific knowledge,” Mayor Moran told Council members, a metaphorical glove swinging into the face of councillors.
‘Totally aspirational’
Fine Gael councillors were the quickest to take offence at the overturning of the apple cart, with Cllr Sarah Kiely suggesting that despite a suggested lack of experience, councillor’s “skillsets are unique. I don’t think they can be pigeonholed. We have the transparency and the oversight to represent the people of Limerick and we need to represent their interests on these boards.”
Her party colleague Stephen Keary added his concerns that the Mayor’s move would see a return to the “old pals act”. He feared that individuals could be selected for boards by the Mayor who were “colleagues or mates”.
And the bottom of the barrell hadn’t been reached yet, friends.
When Mayor Moran presented his plan for 101 actions to be delivered in the first 101 days of his mayoralty, Cllr Keary once again had strong opinions.
“There’s millions needed there if you were trying to aspire to do what you are saying,” Keary insisted.
“Supporting construction and tourism, that’s fine. But how can you help public health infrastructure and mental health initiatives? That’s not part of our remit. We can sit on the HSE’s Western Health Board where we can call it, but that’s as far as we can go.”
He deemed Moran’s ambitions “totally aspirational”.
When he presented his draft mayoral plan to councillors a month later, the response was equally dour.
“Honestly, I think the mayoral programme is setting all of us councillors up for failure,” Social Democrats councilor Elisa O’Donovan warned.
“The Mayor made some big promises during his campaign, not least including solving the housing crisis. If he cannot deliver on those promises, then it is down to him, and not us councillors who have spent the summer adding and finalising this programme to exactly what the Mayor wishes – of which I am not still sure what he wants.”
‘Work with us, not against us’
Moran envisions a Limerick in which O’Connell Street and Georgian Limerick can be a “globally recognised” tourist destinations boasting sports, shopping, museums, and dining. In Moran’s future Limerick, a total of 50,000 new residents will be comfortably accommodated by 2040.
His main aspirations include more amenities and improved public transport for county towns and villages, better road safety, increased Garda resources, investment in neglected buildings, and making areas in South East Limerick – such as Lough Gur, Kilmallock, and Ballyhoura – a tourist destination to rival any other. In short, as the man says, ‘More for Limerick’.
Councillors again rained on his parade.
Cllr Liam Galvin made it clear to the Mayor that if his programme was a failure, it is on no one else’s head but his own. The Fine Gael man took the position that the Mayor’s plan had “way too many promises” and that he and his would “not be held accountable for its success or failure”.
Having had a period to consider the 100+ page document, and having been asked to contribute ideas and asks into the draft plan, councillors voted 21 to 16 in favour of deferring the draft meeting on the mayoral programme until after workshops to break down the document were carried out in September.
Mayor Moran proved he was unafraid to stand alone and not long later vexed a number of councillors even more by revealing plans to move forward with his draft mayoral programme without them.
And again at the recent annual budget meeting, there was more sharp tongues taking aim at Mayor Moran.
Fine Gael councillor Adam Teskey felt there was a lesson to be learned for the Mayor from his first budget meeting with councillors, suggesting Moran “work with us, not against us”.
“Politics is about compromise and bringing people together, creating bridges where there’s divisions,” he cried out.
Hopefully, as we move into a new year, all 41 elected members of Limerick City and Council will at last take stock of Cllr Teskey’s wise words – including Adam ‘Blindboy Who?’ Teskey himself.
Remember, we are all products of our past. Let us not be prisoners of it.
