Our New Year Resolutions.

Edinburgh Castle & our Hogmanay party.

In Scotland we do not celebrate the coming of the New Year we celebrate the passing of the Old Year. Our Hogmanay, which is also celebrated on the 31^st December, is quite probably a Norse and Gaelic fusion that originally celebrated the winter solstice.

Our modern version allows for a rather delightful custom of “first-footing” where, just after midnight, we would visit our neighbours, bringing them a lump of coal for their fire, whisky to warm them up and, depending on where you live, some food in the form of a type of rich fruit cake (or black bun) or even the gift of the odd pickled herring!

Auld Lang Syne lip syncing begins.

It is at this time of year, when the bells are struck at mid-night that we all stand on wobbly, booze soaked legs, we link our arms together in one big circle and sing one of Scotland’s most famous poems “Auld Lang Syne”, penned by none other than Robert Burns. This is one of those songs that we all know the chorus to but as for the other words and verses they are lost in a hail strum of slurred humming and pretend voice syncing that would do our modern day pop stars proud.

Like that other tradition, we Scots do however make the odd New Year resolution, mostly around having a healthier life style for the year ahead. We do go out of our way to make such commitments but the lure of one of our culinary contributions to world food, the deep fried mars bar, comes a calling after the Hogmanay hangover and usually within 24 hours the healthier resolution has been kicked into touch.

So what should we look for when we are considering Waterford’s New Year resolutions?

Culinary heart attack in a box!

I do hope that those with both power and influence for Waterford will have tangible 2016 New Year resolutions that will essentially deliver. For so many years we have missed out on investment whilst other neighbouring counties have benefited from so many New Year promises.

As the Government is currently awash with lots of extra tax revenue, and influencers are stuffing their own constituency ballot boxes with this extra cash, I would ask for €15 million to invest in UHW’s cardiology unit. This will allow the speedy completion of the unit and sufficient funding to run the service for the next 3, 4 or 5 years.

Another €20 million to finally deliver and create a University for Waterford and the South East with all the bells and whistles needed to attract significant research funding. Not a fudged pressure delivered hotchpotch multi-campus minestrone soup of an organisation, as is being proposed, but a REAL University based and administered in Waterford City that will clearly benefit the economic future of the entire South East.

A further €25 million to develop our North Quay, the railway station and the port to drive a whole new tourism market for Waterford and the South East. If we could develop these three vital pieces of the City’s infrastructure we could place Waterford City at the very heart of the Ireland’s Ancient East tourism project and make Waterford City the 3 or 4 night destination stop that would be the anchor for every tourist wishing to explore this Ancient East region.

Happy Hogmanay!

Only circa €60 million, and not a long term loan, would go a long way to redressing the lack of focused investment in Waterford and the South East. We are at the moment seeing our hospital, our docks/port and our third level education establishment being ever so slowly dismantled and systematically taken away from us. If we are not careful these essential pieces of infrastructure will soon disappear for good.

If we do not have strong political and public representation fighting for every Euro of the Government investment pie we will remain the City that always had concrete New Year resolutions that were never actually delivered.

We do not want to be eating deep fried Mars Bars early next year.

Happy Hogmanay!

The countdown is well and truly on!

A Countdown conundrum!

A little over one week to C-Day and joy of joys the City Centre, last weekend, had a steady flow of people alternating between the spine of the City, the Barronstrand Street, John Robert’s Square, Broad Street, Michael Street and Applemarket axis, and the Viking Triangle area, with a few popping up the hill to take in the winter offerings in and around Ballybricken.

I believe that the whole offering last Sunday was exceptional and after an unspeakable spell of very bad weather many people and many visitors took respite after storm Desmond, and committed to going out prior to the next storm Eva arriving, to come into the City Centre and sample Waterford at Christmas.

2015 is in fact my fifteenth Christmas in Waterford and over these last fifteen years I have witnessed the City grow in stature as a destination for Christmas shoppers. These much needed and very welcomed shoppers are the lifeblood of many of our businesses and the festive period is probably one of the few times of the year where a profit can actually be made.

Many of our businesses can be operating on margins as low as 5% and that means the tills need to ring at an ever faster pace in order to make enough margin to see businesses through the barren and lean months of January and February that follow the flurry of Christmas activity.

There was much on offer on Sunday 13^th December and one of the highlights had to be the Winter Wonderbands competition that saw the City of Waterford Brass lift the inaugural Waterford Business Group sponsored trophy.

Jubilant City of Waterford Brass.

The concept saw three of our City’s finest, the City of Waterford Brass, De La Salle Scouts Pipe Band and the Thomas Francis Meagher Fife and Drum Band, compete across three performance areas located in Broad Street, Applemarket and the Bishop’s Palace. The whole event was supported by WLR FM’s outside broadcast unit and a running update was given live on air throughout the afternoon.

At just after 3pm the winners were announced and after much whooping and hollering interviews with the judges and band members took place live on air. This event will return in 2016 with perhaps as many as ten competing bands and in 2017 the whole event has the potential to become a national event taking in both a Saturday and a Sunday.

Winter Wonderbands was part of a promoted “Shop Local Sunday” commitment and it gave those who ventured into the City Centre something a little bit extra special and it also gave three of our City bands the opportunity to showcase themselves to a whole new market audience.

The reaction to the competition was priceless. With mums, dads, kids, and grandparents all stopping to sing, tap their feet, dance and jump around with excitement as one after another our favourite Christmas tunes were energetically played by all the band members concerned. Whilst it is very difficult to solely judge three very different bands one of the criteria for judging was audience participation and all three bands made a monumental effort to get their audience involved.

Calvin's logic.

A very high bar has now been set as many visitors to the City thought that this type of activity was the norm for Waterford at Christmas. I have no doubt that many will have left Waterford last weekend wishing they lived here and after what was on offer who can blame them for thinking that way.

It often takes an “outsider’s eyes” to remind us just what we have to offer and so many visitors to Waterford see a wonderful compact medieval City that is both big enough and yet small enough to enjoy.

Our challenge will be to continue that offering far beyond C-Day and ensure our City grows and expends at a rapid pace. The solid foundations are there we just need to give a few people a gentile New Year kick in the ass to remind them what is needed. 

Waterford cannot just be for Christmas!

As we head inextricably towards Christmas Day it was great to see the City Centre so busy last weekend, despite the best efforts of storm Desmond. It has been quite clear for some time now that our traditional Waterford shopping days are now Thursday, Friday and Saturday and of course Sunday, probably being the busiest shopping day due to the unlimited FREE car parking we can all avail of.

It is great to see these increased footfall numbers that our City Centre retailers so badly need and of course the Winterval Festival and the Waterford Business Group’s “Shop Local Sunday”, the 13^th December, and the Winter Wonderbands competition, Sunday 13^th December, will all help to keep those footfall numbers UP!

What about after this Festive period?

Teresa Mannion taking on storm Desmond!

The fact is that Waterford businesses need to have continuous support to help keep these SME’s in business. To put it bluntly there has to be money coming across the counter in order for businesses to employ staff, pay commercial rates, pay insurance premiums, pay utility bills, pay vat, pay revenue etc. The cost of being in business is very high and enormously challenging and many of the businesses we love and support are in fact operating at tiny margins, some as low as 5%.

These tiny margins make it extraordinarily challenging to absorb any increased business costs and therefore the only way for many of these businesses to survive and grow is to see a reduction in business costs coupled with significant increases in footfall numbers across the City and County.

However, this message I fear is being loss on so many of those that represent us.

My journalistic colleagues and I do not for one moment class myself as one of our City’s journalist (truth is I just always wanted an excuse to say that phrase), have indicated to me that at the Councils recent “behind closed doors budget meetings” a cohort of Councillors had advocated an INCREASE in commercial rates and an INCREASE in City Centre car parking charges. Perhaps proof that these sources were correct was the fact that there was also a proposal to implement car parking charges in Dunmore East, which was subsequently defeated.

In the end what we ended up with, after I hope was some robust lobbying, was no rates and no car parking increases but a 20% commercial rates charge on empty shops and empty premises for 2016 and beyond.

The fact that such increases were even considered shows just how out of touch some of our Councillors are with the realities of being in business in the City and County. Perhaps these Councillors should identify themselves and explain to us their justification as to why they considered those aforementioned increases appropriate to the many businesses across the City and County.

I fear now that the new “empty building” commercial rates charge may in fact create a big hairy retail monster for the City Centre. If distressed property owners are in reality being forced to rent out their properties, you have to ask yourself just what type of retailer will fill such premises at what can only be very low rental prices.

Far from offering a carrot to getting premises let are we not in danger of filling our City and County with the very retailers that will drive footfall elsewhere, where there is better choice and a better retail mix?

To generate much needed increased footfall and the higher spend that will eventually attract new retailers to the City Centre, the very retailers that my daughter keeps harping on about, we need to create a holistic approach that gives out far more carrots and does less beating with a stick.

We are not there just yet and in order to get there we need more direct lobbying by the very people who understand the dynamics of being in business in Waterford.

Time to speak the truth even if your voice shakes.

Our chance to make a land grab!

"We can use these & fill them with the North Quay rubble."

My recent article, published in the Waterford Today, on the North Quay’s demolition has certainly sparked much debate around the lack of removal of the rubble and a number of people have been in touch stating that they were led to believe that the whole site would be left “clean and clear” once the demolition had taken place.

The potential for huge piles of rubble, which we could all be staring at for months on end, got me thinking about a creative way WE could help to shift said rubble as a cost neutral exercise for Council. That is assuming that the rubble will not be left in architecturally pleasing piles that we are told resemble the pyramids of Giza.

It is only a matter of time before we get the call to arms, which will be broadcast loud and clear on Deise AM, for the people of Waterford to get involved in helping shift the rubble as no extra money could be found in the Council’s 2016 budget to do this on our behalf.

I can just imagine thousands of people from Waterford marching across Rice Bridge and visiting the North Quays wearing overly baggy trousers and, rather strangely, being observed placing large quantities of the rubble into their trouser pockets. In a similar manner to Messer McQueen, Gardner, Pleasance and Attenborough in The Great Escape and of course Robbins in The Shawshank Redemption.

How long will it take to build a new wall?

Having secretly filled hidden jute sacks inside their baggy trouser legs the people of Waterford would head off in the direction of Ferrybank and the Port where they would deposit the rubble along Minister Coffey’s proposed new boundary line.

Over a period of months the North Quay would be rid of the rubble and a new city wall would have appeared, grabbing the very land that Kilkenny Councillors are incredulously protecting. An area that, until now, Kilkenny Council seem to have had no interest in until they heard the sound of commercial rates income coming from the expansion of the IDA site at the Port of Waterford.

Literally over night Waterford City would have expanded and we would suddenly, for once and for all, have incorporated Ferrybank and the Port of Waterford under the control of Waterford Council. There would be no need for any more committee discussions as the people of Waterford would have taken the bulls by the horns, bypassed all the political rhetoric and done what should have be done years ago.

The added bonus would be that our history of unconquerable walls is good, “Urbs Intacta Manet”, and once we secured the land grab it would be impossible for Kilkenny to take it back.

With such large quantities of stone and rubble needing to be moved we could also restart the old jute factory and for a short window of opportunity someone could create a wee cottage industry to supply the small jute sacks ideally sized to perfectly fit inside a trouser leg. Eventually the old jute factory could be turned into a real working museum along the lines of Verdant Mills in Dundee.

A hot topic on both sides of the River Suir.

The above is of course fantasy and the ramblings of an over active mind but the sentiment and meaning are real.

If Waterford City and County are to compete with our neighbouring counties and towns then we really need to look to the future with added aggression and ambition.

The North Quay must not become an eyesore for our citizens and the City’s 2016 visitors. It was hard enough to keep positive when the works on the South Quay were taking place and trying to constantly explain that “2011 Tall Ships are coming back” banner was beyond a joke!

Optics is everything. Incorporating Ferrybank and the Port into the City will make us a better place to invest in and, more significantly, we will be able to control our shop window to the City, which at the moment is controlled by Kilkenny Council. 

Now where is the sense in that!

Done and dusted.

As Winterval comes to the end of its first week we can look forward to a busy Christmas and hopefully the many businesses in and around the City Centre will see a much needed boost in sales that will carry them through into 2016. In 2016 all we can hope for as a Christmas present is a much bigger slice of the recovery cake and that all the headline promises we have read and heard about in our local media will be delivered by those making the promises.

Remember, it is very dangerous to over promise!

Waterford’s Four are now in election mode and are willing to promise delivery on projects that in truth should have been delivered months and years ago. No doubt over the next few weeks and months we will be endlessly bombarded with just how lucky we have been in terms of investment. So we really must ask ourselves if what has come our way is good enough or can be accepted as the absolute minimum that was needed to be delivered over the lifetime of the last Government. I would advocate that Government has under delivered for Waterford.

The simple fact is that more should have come Waterford’s way over the last number of years and we must all understand that any investment, that has managed to travel down the M9 from Dublin, has not been nearly enough and, yes, we may well sit at the top table but we are still feeding off the crumbs thrown to us and we have still not been invited to choose from the menu.

At the last Waterford Council plenary meeting, held in Dungarvan, the Council passed the Waterford City Centre Urban Renewal Scheme. A Scheme that will see circa €4,000,000 come from Government and circa €4,000,000 come from Waterford Council. Why ALL the money for the Scheme cannot come from Government I do not know!

The final meaty document contains all the plans, altered plans and reference to the 76 submissions from organisations, groups, individuals, businesses and Councillors – well 4 Councillors to be very precise.

Councillors Mulligan, Kelly, O’Neill and Daniels appear to be the only four Councillors out of our 32 good men and women of the Council, who seem to have been bothered to lodge a written submission. I will hazard a guess that many more will claim a significant input, behind closed doors, in committee, to this development document – but it would have been fitting for us, members of the public, to be able to actually read and dissect our Councillors input and observations, so that we can judge for ourselves the level of that input.

The final document is now done and dusted and all indications are that the work will start early in 2016 with the promise that no work on reducing car parking spaces will commence until the gas works car park is delivered – first muted for completion some 4 or 5 years ago!

During last week’s Metropolitan Council meeting we heard that the demolition for the North Quay was also done and dusted (again) and the work would start in the New Year. However, not many people will realise that we are to be left with piles of “concrete road foundation stones” of around 5cm square.

Swindon's Magic Roundabout

This substrate will be left on the North Quay until such times as it can be used.

The debacle that was the broadcast centre roundabout is now done and dusted. People power made all the difference and I have no doubt that this engineering master class has seen the Council receive the most amounts of complaints since records began.

It just goes to show that when we all work together mountains can be moved. Unfortunately, social media was almost instantaneously awash with Councillors claiming individual credit for what really should have been acknowledged as a remarkable team effort to turn around an experiment that a five year old Lego user could see would not work.

An attack on our Liberté.

I prepare to write this blog based on my experiences of the previous week and around events and meetings that I may have attended, which I feel the readers would be interested to read my commentary on. My blog is also a reflection of my weekly article in one of Waterford City's local newspapers. 

So, last week I was going to write and express my views on my attendance at the recent plenary session of Waterford Council, in Dungarvan, and, of course, the debacle that was the Broadcast Centre roundabout on the ring road, which on Friday afternoon was miraculously reduced to one lane at the apparent insistence of the National Roads Authority, as part of some “continental style” traffic management experiment.

However, as I watched the Bosnia and Herzegovina versus Ireland qualifier, on a foggy night in Zenica, social media started to light up and flash reports of gun attacks and bombings taking place across the whole of Paris.

As the news started to filter through it became very apparent that Paris was once again under attack and, for the second time in 2015, there was a Multi Pronged Terrorist Attack (MPTA) taking place across the capital city of France. No one could have imagined that only ten months on from the Charlie Hebdo and Jewish supermarket attacks that we would once again be revisiting all the horrors associated with a coordinated and heinous attack on the City, the nation and the people that live by the motto “Liberté, Egalité and Fraternité”.

By now there have been thousands of words written about last Friday’s MPTA and perhaps more worryingly for all of us is that this latest attack was not aimed at one organisation but unmistakably targeted a nation and its people. Worryingly, this latest attack targeted more than just the French nation as it also targeted Germany and the USA. The German football team were playing in the Stade de France and a US band was playing in the Bataclan Theatre, and if it was not for an observant security guard a suicide bomber would have accessed fans in the Stade de France!

We are now beginning to see a new type of terrorism that can coordinate and operate multiple near-simultaneous bombings and shootings and questions have to be asked if our Western security forces can cope with and prevent such coordinated attacks in the future. I fear that the determined terrorists we are now facing will always manage to evade security forces, as these can never be 100% secure, and inflict their own perverted style of justice on our Western world.

The future of free border access across Europe, which were created in 1985 with The Schengen Agreement, must now to be reviewed as evidence emerges on how the terrorists were able to travel freely crossing borders in cars weighed down with weapons, bombs and ammunition.

If we are to protect the very freedoms that allow us to write commentary in the printed media, post opposing observations on social media and permit us the opportunity air our own views, and argue these robustly in public, then we must be prepared to protect these fundamental rights.

Friday 13^th November will change Europe forever and, unlike the events in Paris of 7^th January, last Friday’s events will alter our views and our perception of just how safe our society is. As European nations begin to pick through the evidence that will eventually trace the origins of this monstrous attack, we must hope and trust that a global solution will now be found and implemented.

ISIS is a growing threat to the very way we lead our lives and we have to find a consistent solution that protects us in our own free society. We cannot allow terrorist organisations to dictate our liberty just because they fundamentally disagree with our way of living. We must jealously protect those freedoms and perhaps, just perhaps, we need drop our PC mumbo jumbo rhetoric and start some straight talking as how to best look after OUR hard fought societal freedoms.

It is Budget time once again!

The 2015/2016 national budget is now behind us and we are just awaiting some last minute discussions in the Dáil, some machinations in the Seanad, and then the final approval of the Finance Bill, traditionally, sometime in February and then it will be all over for another year and it could well be the last budget delivered by the FG/Labour coalition as we move inextricably towards the promised “E-A-R-L-Y” spring election. Before we know it, it will be 2016 and we will all have forgotten about Mr Noonan’s last budget.

However, for us in Waterford, there is another budget looming on the horizon – the Waterford City and County Council budget.

As the Council begin to mull over their financial figures and projections for 2016, we are once again nearer the time for our Council Executive and our Council Representatives to vote on the 2016 budget, which will be somewhere around the €132,000,000 mark! It is a time for us to see how our representatives perform in what is seen by many as their most fundamental task.

Will the proposed budget be passed? Will we see pact voting? Will we see strategic voting? Will we see a genuine forensics analysis of the budget figures?

This is the time of year when our public representatives earn their corn and it really is a time of year when we hope that they will look at the bigger picture, rather than a parochial view of their own wards, and make the right decisions that will drive economic investment back into the City Centre and further afield across the whole County. Failure to understand the economics of making sound budgetary decisions will have a profound effect on how we perform as a City and County in 2016.

This budget sets out the Council’s spending plans for 2016 and also sets income targets on big ticket items such as the Commercial Rates collection which in the last budget was circa €32,000,000, it sets the household charges, car parking charges and all the other associated cost centres that will allow the Council to operate for the next 12 months. We will also see spending plans outlined and discussed such as the delivery of the Waterford City Centre Urban Renewal Plans, festival spending budgets, roads maintenance plans, housing spending and much, much more besides.

The headline figures for businesses will, of course, be the Commercial Rates collection amounts and whether or not these will remain the same, increase or ideally, for businesses to invest, these should be reduced by up to 20%. A rates reduction will encourage investment, will increase employment and will make for a better City Centre.

Alas, I feel that these will remain the same as the last two years and yet the brave decision has to be the introduction of a significant reduction to help struggling City Centre businesses. Any offset in the reduction of rates will be collected with new businesses starting up and a significant rates reduction will go some way to encouraging the retail brands the City is currently missing to invest in Waterford. In addition a better retail mix will drive increased footfall and this in turn will also encourage more business start-ups and these new businesses will pay their share in commercial rates. Win Win!

Another brave decision would be the reduction in car parking charges and, if the Council take the lead in this process, then the private owners have to follow suits. This is still the elephant in the room and until we tackle this issue we will find it increasingly difficult to encourage the people on the “Dunmore Road” into the City Centre never mind further afield.

I still wonder if, due to their free car parking passes, our representatives see the car parking as an issue or perhaps they drive around wearing rose tinted glasses.

After all, if it costs you nothing, zero, nada, nil to park your car in Waterford City and County why would there be a problem?

Tourism – the biggest industry in the World!

Tell me what you really think.

Those readers who know me will know that over the last twelve months I have literally come out of the closest in my Lycra and can officially be described as a MAMIL (middle aged man in Lycra). It is a hobby that has taken me all over the south east and further afield, around this island of green. In fact since I had to hung up my golf bats (due to old rugby injuries), cycling is a sport I have taken to my heart over the last 15 months and I am now just a few of kilometres short of cycling 10,000km. I, like most of today’s cyclists have an App, as there is an App for everything, and this App also show that I have climbed nearly 62,000m in those 15 months - hard to comprehend just how high that is.

Who needs the Tour de France when we have so much available to us on our doorstep here in Waterford.

The unseasonably good weather has allowed me to continue to cycle in my Lycra shorts over the last couple of weekends and last Saturday and Sunday was no different. So mild was the weather that I even managed to see a few butterflies out and about, and I also managed to be hit by several bumble bees, and being smacked on the face by a bumble bee at 30 plus kph stings like hell!

It has amazed me that as we head into the depths of winter our wonderful countryside and coastline are still accessible whether you are on a bike, in a car or simply just walking. Being able to see the vast array of autumnal colours that coat our countryside at this time of the year I can see why this is the favourite time for so many people. There were simply oodles of people out and about over the weekend and car parks that access our stunning coves and beeches, whilst not heaving, were very busy with families taking the opportunity to enjoy the extremely mild weather and get one or two last autumnal walks in, with the dog, before the winter weather finally decides to arrive.

The more I cycle around Waterford and the south east, the more I come to appreciated exactly what we have on our doorstep and I do often wonder if we are really utilising this natural beauty for the benefit of ourselves and as a potential tourism income generator.

We all know that Ireland’s Ancient East has been designed as a tourism driver in an attempt to balance the tens of millions being spent on dragging millions of tourist “out west” to the Wild Atlantic Way. Yet we read recently that funding for this project across Waterford and the south east has not been forthcoming and we must ask why? I would also hazard a guess that many readers will not be aware that the Ireland’s Ancient East project is now over two years old and we are yet to see any real economic benefits from this new branding.

 

In my 10,000km of cycling around the south east I have yet to see one sign proclaiming that you are in Ireland’s Ancient East and I am yet to see any real signs of branding that will encourage our tourists to spend their Euro in Waterford and this region. I fear that we are yet again being dreadfully acceptant that what has been delivered to date is satisfactory and adequate to compete with other tourism offerings.

We have accessible scenery that rivals the very best in Ireland and we have a tourism offering that certainly competes with some of the more established brands in Ireland and yet we seem to be, once again, the poorer cousin when it comes to funding and shouting about just what we have to offer.

More must be done for Waterford and the south east as after all tourism is the biggest industry in the World!

“E-A-R-L-Y” – we all know how to spell that word Enda!

It was suggested by Enda Kenny in last week’s national news that the 2016 General Election would be held in early spring and, just to emphasise the point, the Taoiseach actually spelled the word for us just to make it easier to understand, “Early in the Spring. E-A-R-L-Y.” he stated whilst at an event in Madrid.

Anyone would think he was a school teacher – oh wait a minute, he is!

At least now we know that the country is on General Election footing and have no doubt that ALL the political parties and independent TDs are gathering their troops and starting to plan their election campaigns. And this will give an opportunity to all of us, who have registered to vote, to plan our own questions for those putting their names forward for the 2016 General Election.

For those who have not registered to vote, there is still time to make sure that you can have your say and let me be very clear that everyone should register to vote and then everyone will be allowed to have their say and ultimately influence the result next year. There will no doubt be many sitting TDs hoping and praying that new voters do not appear on the register and, in fact, I am sure that many of these TDs are in fact quite happy at the very poor levels of political engagement seen across this country. This means that they will yet again rely on diehard traditional voters to come out and vote. Thus, returning the same average number of electoral votes we are now used to seeing year after year after year.

Coming back for 2016!

Now, just for one minute, imagine that the whole of Ireland were to become enthused with politics over the next six months and then just imagine how much effort and engagement our political representatives would be forced to make with every single voter. We would all feel the better for increased levels of engagement and therefore we would all be able to grill and demand a better performance from our representatives. You only have to look across the Channel to see what difference higher levels of public engagement has made to the political map in Scotland and in the UK in general. And only when higher levels of public engagement are made can we really hold our representatives accountable to us the V-O-T-E-R.

If we are to make changes for the better in Irish Politics then we, the V-O-T-E-R, must be more vocal, more interactive and we need to benchmark just how our representatives are performing.

We have heard over the last few weeks promises of this funding and that funding for Waterford City and County when, in reality, once you read the very small print, many of these headline grabbers are in fact “pipedreams!” If these are not pipedreams then the promise of funding and game changer investments must be delivered and delivered now. If they cannot be delivered prior to the next Election then Government’s promised investment in our City and County must be ring fenced and we need our existing TDs to “SHOW US THE MONEY!” before E-Day in 2016.

 

I fear that, as we move ever closer to an “E-A-R-L-Y” spring election, we will start to read and hear more and more spin about what has been delivered and what can be delivered in the future.

However, if we are really to see our representatives making a R-E-A-L difference to Waterford, then we, the electorate, must once and for all engage with everyone who puts their name forward for the 2016 Election. We must tell them what we want and let them know that we will be monitoring their performance, their promises and we will ultimately judge their honesty.

What we cannot do in the 2016 General Election is revert back to our old “traditional voting preferences” as that is just what we are expected to do.

Let us “C-H-A-L-L-E-N-G-E” the mediocrity in 2016!

Perception is everything!

When marketing or branding a product or service, that is predominantly aimed at members of the public, our perception is all encompassing to the process of actually successfully buying that product or service.

In circumstances where we have a poor perception of a product or service we are pre-programmed to avoid at all costs and to a greater degree we imagine, rightly or wrongly, that said product or service is inherently poor or inferior, regardless of what the marketing messages might be telling us.

By definition, perception is the process in which we use our senses to acquire information about the surrounding environment or a particular situation.

And how does this exactly relate to Waterford City.

It is very simple. Everyone’s perception of Waterford City varies in an ever so slightly different way because we all sense experiences in slightly differing ways.

To my mind the City still has a huge untapped potential that needs to be realised in the short and medium term to get the City back as the economic hub of the South East. In my current work role and through my involvement with various groups and committees I see firsthand the enormous amount of work being planned and being carried out. This work will, without any doubt, benefit the many businesses and therefore all the people of Waterford City and County in the very near future.

However, as I am so immersed in these processes my perception more often than not differs from that of my family, my close friends and my business colleagues. I just constantly see that the City and County have not really scratched the surface of what is possible to drive the region forward and for Waterford City to regain its rightful place as the fourth City of Ireland (in economic terms). 

I am always a glass half full person.

I do often feel that I am sometimes alone in that positivity or at the very least I am one of a very small minority that sees a positive future vision that will literally put Waterford back on the map.

I have advocated on many occasions, both in print and on radio, that every voter in Waterford should attend at least one Council meeting in their lifetime. This will give voters the chance to see at firsthand how Council runs, functions and operates through our locally elected representatives. It will also help people understand how the City and or County are perceived through the eyes our elected representatives and the council executive.

Is your vision of the City the same as that of our elected representatives?

With an ever improving retail offering we must encourage even more people back into Waterford City Centre to experience these new shopping opportunities and with the proposed additional shopping centre to come on stream we must take every opportunity to drive up footfall in the City Centre.

It is more important than ever to get this right as we now see out of City Centre retail villages offering a real carrot to attracting shoppers – lots of free car parking!

The many City Centre retail shops can encourage people across their threshold with sales, end of season sales and lots of seasonal special offers. So why can we not look towards opportunities that offer a similar enticing promotion based around parking your car?

Monaco where the first hour of car parking is FREE!

Will further reduced car parking rates or specific car parking offers, similar to those in Cork, Limerick, Dungarvan and Kilkenny, bring increased footfall back into to the City Centre?

Well, we will not know until we have tried and until we try we will always be perceived, by the people of Waterford and many of our visitors, as an expensive place to park a car - no matter what the car park sign states the hourly rate might be.

On a sporting day of green Waterford City is turned orange!

Start line - George's Street.

I was fortunate to be asked to Chair the South Eastern Cancer Foundation Solas Centre's main charity fundraiser in 2015, namely the "South East Run and Walk for Life". As a fundraising event it is of huge significance to the Solas Centre so how could I refuse the request. Being involved has literally blown my socks off in terms of how important the Solas Centre is to so many lives right across the South East. 

In light for this my blog this week is the actual final press release I wrote covering the "Run and Walk for Life 2015". I am sure that readers will get a flavour of the event and how we plan to make the occasion even bigger in 2016. 

On Sunday 11^th October over 2,000 people ran, jogged, walked and crawled their way around the Solas Centre Run and Walk for Life courses. It was a day of great joy and huge positivity as thousands of people took on the challenge of the 10-mile running route or the 5-mile walking route.

All participants set off from Gladstone Street at 12:30 on the dot and proceeded down The Quay, up The Mall and then spilt, with walkers heading up John’s Hill and runners heading out towards the ring road, before turning back towards the City at the Ballindud roundabout. Both the runners and walkers passed the Solas Centre at the Williamstown roundabout before once again splitting and then converging once more to travel down the Dunmore Road and finally into the People’s Park and across the finish line. Once medals were handed out, every single finishing participant and their supporters enjoyed the Fun for Life, which continued late into the afternoon.

On such a big sporting day when the whole country had literally gone green, with the Rugby World Cup and Euro 2016, Waterford City was a sea of orange as far as the eye could see.

Commenting on the successful day was Michael Garland, Chair of the Solas Centre Run and Walk for Life, “On behalf of the organising committee we would like to thank ALL the participants, our sponsors, volunteers and everyone who gave up their time to help with the event.

Team Pete.

To see so many taking part was honestly just joyous and we knew at the end of Saturday night’s registration that the numbers were going to be very good. In fact we have exceeded our target of 2,015 participants and that is testament to ALL involved and verification that the Solas Centre holds a very special place in so many people’s hearts.

The introduction of the 5-mile walk has opened up a whole new group of participants and we will start planning the 2016 event in the next few weeks once we have had time to take on board all the feedback. We know that to bring the event to another level in 2016 we have to look at some aspects of combining runners and walkers and we will do this in preparation for next year’s event.

Once again we would like to thank ALL those who took part and ALL those who helped with the event. We look forward to seeing you ALL in 2016.”

As Chair of the Solas Centre Dr Brian Creedon is responsible for operating and running the Solas Centre, “As Chair of the Solas Centre I have to thank all involved from the Committee to the runners and walkers. We set a very ambitious target, in terms of numbers, and I am thrilled that we reached and exceeded that target.

Team Dog!

From the moment Mayor John Cummins officially started the event to the moment the very last walkers completed the course it was one of the most rewarding 4 hours I have so far experienced in all my previous Run for Life events. 2015 will be remembered as the event that literally put the Run and Walk for Life back on the map.

With such a large event we could not organise it without the support of our many sponsors and event partners. The main sponsors in 2015 were of course Datapac and Beat 102-103 and the likes of Waterford Council, Garda and other volunteer organisation rolled in behind the event. There are far too many to mention and we will in due course acknowledge everyone with an open “Thank you” night in the Solas Centre.

Once again we would like to thank all the 2,000 participants and we look forward to welcoming you all back in 2016.”

How ithers see us!

Chocolate Mannequin Pis - what bit would you bite first?

Like it or not we do so many things in our day to day lives through our eyes.

We pick our partners on their looks. The first thing that attracts us to the opposite sex is the look of said possible suitor. All other traits such as personality, sense of humour etc come later. If we like what we are looking at then the chances are we will pursue, chase and ultimately get together. And when you look at the animal kingdom that is why so much effort is made in courtship that so often involves colour, dance, display etc as it is the eyes that do most of the initial work.

Trying too hard?

We choose holidays based on the pictures in brochures or based on pictures we have researched on the internet. I have no doubt that many readers now use the internet to actually look at, in real-time, holiday destinations. We also look at pictures posted by other holiday makers on discussion pages and holiday review sites.

Our food tastes so much better if we like the look of what we are about to eat. That is why so many top chefs spend so much time picking the right ingredients that not only tastes good but will look good on your plate. You only have to look at the plethora of TV chef programmes and look at the time spent on arranging the produce on the plate prior to serving. In fact we have now gone one stage further and we are seeing dishes being served on slate beds, wooden boards and all manner of items that are not our traditional china plate. Going to such great lengths on the presentation are ways to enhance our experiences and to make sure that we come back time and time again.

Should our City be treated any differently? I would argue No!

It has worried me and many others for quite some time now that the entrances to our wonderful City have been a very poor reflection on what our City has to offer. But like it or not the entrances to the City are in many ways our shop window to the City. And like a retail outlet that shop window must be dressed properly and appropriately to give people the right first impression of what type of City they are entering, what the City might have to offer and will the City come up to their expectations!

As it stands I do not believe that we have it right.

If you are driving from Dublin, and assuming that you do not get mixed up with the poor signage and redirected across the toll bridge, then you are presented with a quite foreboding drive down to the train station. The vista is not welcoming and in fact rather industrial. That concrete wall creates a claustrophobic impression and it is somewhere you feel that you must drive passed quickly. This wall is ripe for inclusion as part of the Waterford Walls project and should be a key focus for 2016. Likewise coming in from the Wexford side is also rather industrial and depressing.

But your spirits could be lifted when you see the bridge. But alas this is not festooned with flags, it is not adorned with wonderful floral displays, it is not lit correctly and so on. You do not have to look too far to see just how impressive a well dressed bridge looks - New Ross for example.

Then coming down through the Dunmore Road is like navigating a Himalayan mountain pass. All sorts of different patchwork surfaces, full of big lumps and large bumps and it is never ending.

No matter what spin you put on it we have NOT dressed our shop window correctly and I often wonder just how others see us.

“O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us, To see oursels as ithers see us!” Robert Burns.

More sporting success please!

We must inspire a culture in Waterford that is not afraid or frightened to celebrate success. The recent positivity around our GAA successes, in both the male and female disciplines, has allowed the City and County, albeit far too fleetingly, moments of being “the best of the best”. These successes must be cherished and built upon in futures years to ensure that this becomes a regular annual celebration. Our GAA prowess appears, to this non GAA person, to be on an upward curve and those leading this charge must be applauded, helped and supported.

Having lived in Waterford City for nearly fifteen years I have been excited by many sporting “nearlys” and the margin between success and failure in sport, as in business, is a very, very fine line. Waterford’s sporting teams across all manner of disciplines have on so many occasions almost got there just to be thwarted at the very last minute. But there is always an annual drive and enthusiasm at the start of every season and if that collective will could be harnessed and transferred to the field of play then we would be at the pinnacle of all our City and County sports. Waterford generates passionate supporters and this must be utilised in terms of other aspects of our City and County. If we can literally bring the rafters down shouting for GAA or soccer or rugby then we should be doing likewise for our other City and County assets – yet we seem to remain strangely silent about these!

As a prime example of how leaders in our local sports have a positive affect on not only our own mindset but the mindset of whole communities you do not have to look very far.

Kilkenny Castle

Kilkenny is a prime example of a town that almost certainly, on an annual basis, will celebrate some sort of sporting success. And this sporting celebration filters down through the people of Kilkenny to such an extent that they are not afraid to rejoice, exult and take pride in their own town and the environs of a whole County. Ask someone in Kilkenny how business is going and they will tell you it is going great. Ask someone in Kilkenny about the castle and they will boast about it as if it is the only example in the whole of Ireland. Ask a Kilkenny person about the nightlife, shopping, restaurants etc and you will undoubtedly get the same positive upbeat answer. The people of Kilkenny are, in part, lead by their sports and the senior personalities associated with their sports and they celebrate everything else with just as much gusto, passion and eagerness. And this mentality is infectious and contagious as every visitor to Kilkenny leaves with the same positive impression. It really is a win win for all concerned.

As our GAA success story continues to gather pace we also need to see our soccer team return to winning ways for the benefit of the City and County. In fact if all our sporting sectors can be part of a metaphorical rising tide then this can only benefit everyone. Just imagine future years where we can watch our GAA teams winning at the highest levels, our soccer team on top of the Premier League, our rugby teams back playing senior rugby and so on. To be absolutely blunt our sporting success has to be seen as part of the City’s future and we all must make an effort to support our teams as and when we can. The benefits of sporting success to a local economy cannot be underestimated and the higher the standard the higher the economic spend and the more positive the impact this has on a localised economy. You really do not have to be Adam Smith to realise that if Waterford sporting prowess exponentially grew over the next few years we would all see the economic benefits.

As a City and County looking towards a brighter future we do need to see more positivity from every single inhabitant who lives, works and plays here.

On a daily basis I go out of my way to meet and speak to as many visitors as I can and they are easily identified as they are more often carrying map, or they look lost having inadvertently wandered out of the Viking Triangle, and I would say that 95% of the feedback about the City is extremely positive. I would go further to say that many “love” the idiosyncratic way our medieval architecture leads you through and around our City Centre. Though I do often wonder just how many of us are prepared to do the same. We all know from our own holiday experiences that a friendly welcoming face goes a long way to helping you enjoy and remember a place with fond memories. And really Waterford should be no different.

We have a City that is ideal for walking and discovering and perhaps this needs to be the focus in terms of our future development. Let us use the very assets that make the City what it is today instead of trying to “impose” modern solutions on a Medieval footprint. With the immanent start date for the City Centre Renewal just around the corner I would hope that the circa 70 plus submissions lodged with the Council will be taken into account. And it will be very interesting to see if all the work and effort that went into the engagement with members of the public actually results in positive changes to the overall plan.

Success and the emotion it brings!

I am a great believer that in order to progress in business you must surround yourself with positively minded people. Negative people do not drive businesses forward and, in fact, negative people who hold senior positions within a company or organisation often asphyxiate and smother potential “superstars” from, shall we say, the “lower ranks”. This model can be seen across many organisations including those involved in sport and the trick is spotting this early and then being brave enough to make the right changes.

Maybe we have to see changes from within that will encourage positivity and allow us to free up our lungs to breathe more easily and so in the future we too can shout from the terraces of Croke Park or the Aviva Stadium and be singing the songs of victory.

Finally, well done to our Ladies, just don’t leave it another 17 years to repeat the success – please!