Minutes:
The Lord Mayor opened the meeting by expressing condolences on his own behalf and on behalf of the City Council to the family and friends of the late Dr Finbarr Flood, former Chairman of the Labour Court and Chair of St Michael’s & Fatima Mansion’s Regeneration Boards. All stood for a minute’s silence as a mark of respect for the deceased.
The Lord Mayor then put the following attendances at conferences to the City Council for approval :-
Referring to the current revision of Standing Orders, The Lord Mayor informed the meeting that Review Group would meet on Thursday, 28th July, and that all suggestions for changes received would be put forward to that group under the Lord Mayor’s name.
It was then proposed by Councillor D Lacey and seconded by the Lord Mayor “That Councillors Ring, MacDonncha, Lyons and Mahon be nominated to represent Dublin City Council on the Government’s Moore St Consultative Group and that Councillor Cuffe’s name be put forward with a request for a 5th place on that group” The motion was put and carried.
The Lord Mayor then referred to a report circulated to Members in relation to the offer of gift of a Chinese garden from Yangzhou City, China, which it is proposed to site in Herbert Park. The Members approved the acceptance of the gift and the siting of the garden in Herbert Park. For full text of the report, please see Appendix A to these Minutes.
The Lord Mayor then proposed that, due to the absence of many Members on holiday, all motions would be deferred where the proposer was absent from the Chamber when the motion was reached. This was agreed by the Members. Some discussion then took place on a proposal to award the Freedom of the City but any decision in relation to this was deferred.
The Lord Mayor then allowed 30 minutes discussion on the Action Plan for Housing & Homelessness which was recently launched by Minister Simon Coveney. He referred Members to a report circulated earlier - for full text of the report, please see Appendix B to these Minutes. Many Members contributed to the discussion and welcomed the initiative. The special meeting of the Housing SPC to take place on Friday, 29th July to discuss these issues was welcomed. It was also agreed that a monthly meeting of the SPC would take place in future and that a status report would be presented to the City Council Meeting each month. The Lord Mayor also informed the Members that he and Cllr D Doolan, Chair of the Housing SPC, were available to meet with residents of Lynam Hotel.
The Members and the Chief Executive all congratulated Dr Cathal Morgan, Executive Manger, Dublin Regional Homeless Executive, on his recent promotion to the Health Service Executive and wished him well in his new role. Many tributes were paid to him for his commitment to his role in trying to find solutions to such an important issue.