Chairperson of the BWRA Departure
Posted 10 years ago, 21 Sep 2014
by Mark Hester
The Moyross Residents Alliance are deeply saddened to hear that the Chairperson of the Ballinacurra Weston Residents' Alliance has resigned from his position, Cathal Mc Carthy (Chairperson of BWRA) helped us begin our journey as a group who fights for peoples rights and by helping us to form the Moyross Residents Alliance and the original MRALimerick Website (http://www.archive.mralimerick.com) as a website administrator, with evey chapter that closes, there is a new one that opens, Cathal will still dedicate some time to the MRA and will continue to work on other projects and communities he is involved with. Cathal had the following to say: I regret to announce that I am resigning from the Ballinacurra Weston Residents’ Alliance (BWRA) effective immediately. I am proud of all the BWRA has accomplished over the past 4-years, most notably winning support from the United Nations for our proposals on community participation and in playing a central role in the collective complaint that is winging its way to the European Court of Human Rights. As PRO for the BWRA I feel I did an effective job in highlighting the plight of residents with both the local and national media, I am especially proud of the Sunday World article as it was originally going to be a hatchet piece about us. I have no doubt that the national attention we received from weeks of street protests we organised in 2012 were instrumental in forcing the Council to knock most of the dangerous and derelict burnt-out houses. Unfortunately, other roles within the BWRA were also left to me to perform and the burden has become too much to bear; other committee members have access to the BWRA Facebook account and yet I was the only one keeping it up-dated, other committee members are more than capable of writing letters and sending emails, but I had to perform the role of Secretary. As the saying goes “there is no ‘I’ in team” and for the BWRA committee to continue to function it needs to be a team. The resignation of our Chairperson, Matt Collins, for personal reasons, leaves me as the only participating member on bwra-committeethe committee. I want to make it clear that I fully understand Matt’s reasons for resigning and that I have nothing but the highest respect for him; for some time now it was just the two of us sharing the load. I am not prepared to pretend that we have a functioning committee, that would be just fraudulent and we have enough of that in the area with the residents’ forum pretending to represent the community. The BWRA has plenty of members on paper through membership forms and if any of you would like to step up and share the work then I would be delighted to re-join the committee. The BWRA has €4,600 and without a functioning committee to determine how it is spent it will have to be returned to the funders. A (final?) newsletter will issue shortly and a General Meeting called to see if there is any interest in establishing a new committee. I am resigning from the BWRA, but I remain as Chair of Limerick Regeneration Watch, a member of the Weston Gardens Residents’ Association and as an advisor to the Moyross Residents' Alliance. As I have said, there is no “I” in team, but there are two in “integrity “and there is one in “independent” and my integrity demands of me that I continue to operate as an independent community activist in the area, so if you need any assistance with a complaint to the Ombudsman or the like, then do not hesitate to contact me: 087 784 50 70.
