April.2014
WEISFJORD NEWS
Dear Editor, As I am standing in the May local election as an Independent candidate I would like to give your readers some facts about my record of service to the people of Wexford:• Whether as a shop steward in AEEU ( now UNITE) for over 20 years representing his work colleagues, in Smiths Eng and later Wexford Eletronix Ltd. and also an active supporter of Amnesty Wexford and WSPCA or a member of Wexford Borough Council, he has brought dedication, integrity and honesty in serving Wexford • It’s 17 years since he was first co-opted to Wexford Borough Council following the untimely death of his friend and political mentor the late Michael Enright in 1997:. • Over those years as a Public Representative . actively putting forward many proposals in the area of Jobs, housing, traffic management, young people, drugs & crime. • Mayor of Wexford 2004-05 and 2011- 2012 during the centenary year of the famous Wexford Lock Out. ‘I am very sad to see eight century’s of history abolished at the stroke of a pen without the people even having their say’. • Having a special interest in Mental Health and Addiction having worked in the Cornmarket Project and now working as a volunteer in ‘It’s Good to Talk’ as a Addiction Counsellor ( pre accredited) ‘ I continue to view with concern the higher than average rates of suicide in Wexford and the recent ?15 million cut to mental health the ‘poor relation’ in the health service.’ • ‘One of the main reasons I left the Labour Party was, as part of a Fine Gael led coalition the policy of protecting the wealthy while the weak and most vulnerable were savagely attacked in austerity budgets with cuts to Child Benefit, Medical Cards, Disability services and SNAs to name just some of the many shameful cuts….’ Member of the following boards & committees ;• The Co. Wexford & Waterford ETBI • Board of Management Wexford Vocational College • Wexford Disability Services (CIL) • Former member of SE Drugs Task Force • Chairperson St. Patricks Fife & Drum Band • Wexford Swimming Pool & Leisure Ce Volunteer with Wexford Tidy Towns Davy Hynes
How local government policy could make our local community Stronger, Wiser, More Resilient and Engaged ur modern society is very good at keeping us apart, involved in our own lives and homes, hooked up to television and mass media. We often have precious little time, or inclination, to reach out, to work, talks and, socialising and plays with people unlike ourselves, or to really engage with the place where we live. This is bad for communities and democracy, with total disengagement being the outcome. There are many ways of making communities stronger and more resilient, sustainable and engaged. Here are a few I proposals which if the will was there, could be supported by local government policy. These proposals can apply to both urban and rural communities. STRONGER - We can know a lot more about who we are, as a community, and weave ourselves together into more tight knit units, if some of the following took place. 1) Neighbourhood Help Networks - People sign on to help each other during crises or life changes (moving, serious illness, etc.). This can also take the form of a Facebook or E Mail network, where people can reach each other rapidly and systematically to deal with the crisis or sudden opportunity, without depending on official media. 2) Asset Mapping - We can systematically survey the assets and capacities of individuals, informal networks, organizations and official institutions in our community. 3) Listening Projects – Members of communities can do door-to-door canvassing that doesn't sell, recruit or educate anyone. The sole purpose would be to listen to the ideas and concerns of their neighbours. Many of these structures are already in place, such as residents associations, they just need to listen and be listened to
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WISER - We can either use our diversity to deepen and broaden our shared understandings , or only to divide ourselves from each other? 1) Wisdom Council - A group of a dozen randomly-selected, diverse community members are convened temporarily (like a jury) to craft a consensus statement about what the community thinks and feels, needs and wants. The process used is an advanced, highly creative form of facilitated consensus. A new group is convened once or twice a year. Results are publicized through the media, as well as to citizens and officials in every way possible, for further dialogue and action. 2) Quality of Life Indicators – Communities, with some help, could create their own statistics to measure their quality of life. These are far more useful than standard growth statistics (money, jobs, population, etc.), and can help us see how a community is doing, collectively. 3) World Café Process - Lots of people who want to discuss a topic gather 4-6 to a table and converse in 20-40 minute periods. At the end of each period, they each move to a different table and the conversation proceeds with different people. At the end they return to their original groups and share what they learned "out in the world". MORE RESILIENT - As global forces impact our community, how well are we prepared to survive and bounce back? 1) Community Barter Systems The more a community's wealth stays in the community, the healthier it will be. 2) Community Allotments - As people grow things in a common plot of land, community grows there, too, and gardening knowledge is shared. This can also be done in networks of shared private yard gardens. Community supported agriculture - Community families hire a farmer to grow what they need, and the farmer delivers
it. 3) Nonviolent civilian-based defense. Harvard historian Gene Sharp discovered that nonviolent tactics and strategies were more effective than violent ones, but hardly anyone studied, trained and developed them as thoroughly as they studied and trained and strategized for war. Sharp developed ways for communities and societies to defend themselves non-violently and effectively. MORE ENGAGED - The foundation of a strong, wise, resilient community is people knowing and actively engaging with each other and their place -- simply because it feels good or meaningful to them. Everything else rests on that.... 1) Tidy Towns and neighbourhood aesthetics – The simple projects in which people work together to make an obvious difference in the community. 2) Dinner exchanges - People join a network of those from all over the community who invite each other to dinner to meet others unlike themselves. The network helps smooth the way and helps people reflect on how it's going. 3) Scavenger Hunts and Tours - How well do we know our community? An artist installed dozens of bronze dinosaur tracks for adults and kids alike to try to find.... Stores and schools carry a list of twenty trees or buildings to find... People offer a tour of historic sites or a local herbs tour... 4) Free school and learning exchanges - Everyone in a community knows something someone else would love to learn. It's just a matter of connecting them up, perhaps with some space to meet in. While some may find these ideas fanciful or unrealistic, they are a positive, cost effective ways of making our communities stronger. There will be multiple variations on these; all will have as positive an impact. By Leonard Kelly Facebook: Elect Leonard Kelly
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Letters To The Editor Dear Editor would like to comment on a statement by Wexford’s Senator Michael Darcy in relation to mental health in Wexford, which he made in the Senate recently. In the course of his statement he describes the services in Wexford as ‘a huge success’. He goes on to say ‘If these services are replicated nationwide, the provision of mental health treatment will be in a far better place than it is today under a 'Vision For Change’. Sen. Darcy made these comments and held Wexford up as a model county in terms of the mental health services in commenting on Sen Micheal Mullins concerns over the threatened closure of Ballinashoe Psychiatric hospital? While Sen. Darcy makes out that the modern way of treating mental illness as outlined in a ‘Vision for Change’ is in the community which in general I agree with and would complement the excellent work done in Wexford by mental health nurses etc . But he knows or should know that not all patients can be treated in the community. Many still need treatment in a hospital. Which made his flippant remarks over the closure of St. Senan’s Psychiatric Hospital even more reprehensible and it might come as news to him that not all of us in Wexford are as happy as he is over the closure of our own acute mental health unit in St. Senans Psychiatric hospital which was allowed to close without a replacement for our county, especially since now the unfortunate families of patients having to travel to Waterford to visit a relative and I had a motion passed at the time at the closure of the facility in Enniscorthy, calling for a replacement of St Senans with a 24 hour acute unit for our county. Is he too long up in Dublin to notice that the THE RATE of suicide in County Wexford is one of the highest in Ireland and double the national average. ( reported in the Gorey Guardian June of 1913). In fact the Suicide figures released by the Central Statistics Office show Wexford had 21.2 deaths by suicide per 100,000 people last year. Console, the national suicide prevention and bereavement counselling service said the figures for the county were very worrying. 'This is a serious cause for concern as the national average for death by suicide is 11.1 per 100,000 population,' said Console's Director of Services Ciaran Austin. And bad as the published figures for 2012 are, they do not provide a full and accurate picture. Console say the CSO's figures do not give the full picture of the extent of suicide in Ireland and the charity is calling for a radical review of the procedures for collecting data on suicide so that agencies can identify problems and respond more quickly. Finally as to this government’s commitment to Mental Health over all. I had a motion down recently regarding the cut by the government of which he is a member, where €15 million out of €35 million that was allocated was cut from the mental health budget! Minister Kathleen Lynch has also admitted that she does not have enough staff to tackle the issue of mental health. Some €35m a year had been ring-fenced by his government over a five-year period to deliver mental health services, but only €20m has been made available for 2014. This motion was unanimously passed by all ( including Sen. Darcy’s own party colleagues). The government’s approach to mental health in general which continues to be treated as the ‘poor relation’ and regarding Wexford’s mental health services? It's hardly something to be boasting about and seeking to ‘replicate’ any where else.
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Regards Cllr David Hynes