Éamon De Valera monument will be restored to Carrick-on-Suir Town Hall by end of year, Council meeting told 

The Éamon de Valera monument and wall plaques listing the past chairpersons of the former Carrick-on-Suir urban and town councils are to be re-instated at Carrick Town Hall by the end of the year, Council management has promised. 

Cllr Kieran Bourke (FF) received this assurance when he tabled a motion at Carrick-on-Suir Municipal District's monthly meeting calling for the immediate reinstatement of the De Valera monument at the front of the building and wall plaques listing the past chairpersons of Carrick urban and town councils that  hung in the Town Hall before its refurbishment. 

The Carrick-on-Suir councillor said the Town Hall was re-opened after it refurbishment nearly 12 months ago. It was a fabulous building but internally its walls looked cold and blank.  

"I am passionate about this. There are public representatives who represented this town over a period of 100 years and most of the time they never got a shilling as the did it as their civic duty. The least we can do is to recognise their achievement and to have them here as part of this fabulous building." 

He welcomed the Council's written response to his motion outlining its plans to re-instate the monument and memorabilia and asked the District Administrator to outline a time frame for these works to happen. 

 Mr Nolan said the De Valera monument is currently being sandblasted clean and will be re-instated when the work is done. He hoped the monument will be erected outside the Town Hall before the end of the year. He said the photographs of former local authority chairpersons of Carrick-on-Suir  have been reframed and rehung  in the Town Hall.  

Mr Nolan also said the Council was proposing to get new plaques listing the names of the former chairperson of Carrick councils to replace the old wooden noticeboards that hung in the Council chamber before the refurbishment. 

These plaques along with the chain of office of the former Carrick-on-Suir Town Council, which has been cleaned, will be put on display in the Town Hall by the end of the year. 

Cllr Bourke said he was glad to here Mr Nolan's response.

Mr Nolan replied that  the Council was proceeding slowly and carefully with this project. "It's such a nice building and we don't want to mess it up. We really are being careful," he added.