Community Group to stage Protest at GAA Congress

Started by Gael85, April 15, 2011, 09:55:39 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Gael85

Community Group to stage Protest at GAA Congress


Members of the committee of the Community Group the Croke Park Streets Committees to stage dignified silent protest at GAA Congress taking place at the Mullingar Park Hotel this Friday and Saturday 15th/16th April.

The protest with banners will take place outside the entrance gates of the Hotel. The GAA in Croke Park having failed in its attempt to obstruct the Bar Club license application for the Handball & Community Centre recently indicated its intention to seek to EVICT the community from its Centre.

This is despite the fact that:

· all 17 local politicians and all local residents groups also objected to Croke Parks plans to demolish and replace the existing centre with a centre that Croke Park would control and which had no adequate community facilities. The matter is currently with An Bord Pleanala and a decision has been delayed now for almost 5 months.
· the Community has controlled and maintained the existing Centre for 40 years and invested over €4m of their own money in the Centre
· Croke Park were placed in a position of trust, the Club's constitution to which Croke Park officials helped draw up states that the Centre was VESTED in them.
Please also find attached a copy of the special letter from the community to GAA delegates and a copy of the letter sent to all politicians and Senators in the last government and to which letter almost all cabinet members replied including the Taoiseach, and the leaders of the main Dail parties.

Yours sincerely,
Eamon O'Brien. Fintan Farrelly,
Chairman, Croke Park Streets Committees. Chairman, Handball & Community Centre.

15th April 2011

Letter to GAA Delegates

Dear Delegate,
We write to let you know of the terrible situation we find ourselves in due to the actions of the Croke Park GAA. Straight away let us say that we love the GAA and recognize its enormous contribution to Ireland's economic and cultural development.

Croke Park issue eviction order to our community
However we have grown to despise the money and power hungry Croke Park that constantly disrupts our lives and that have now stooped so low that they are trying to evict our community from the Handball & Community Centre that we have enjoyed and maintained for 40 years - see Newsletter enclosed. Our barrister requested an estimate of the community's investment in the Centre and this came out at €4m with a present value of €5.8m, and this excludes a major amount of social capital. No other community would tolerate this and we are pleading with you as a grassroots delegate to request Croke Park's pin-stripe bullies, as they have been referred to in our community, to show some spark of decency and consideration for the community on whose backs they make so much money.

When our Handball & Community Centre was built Croke Park provided the land with the community, major companies, GAA units, Dublin Corporation and the Department of Education all contributing and that is why it was both a Handball and Community Centre. According to our Club Constitution it is VESTED in the GAA. This is a position of trust that is now being treacherously ignored. We are expected to fight Croke Parks lawyers to save what is rightfully ours. Croke Park hopes we will run out of money. However our politicians, whose objections to planning Croke Park sought to interfere with in spite of GAA Rule 1.11 (see letter to TD's attached), signed a pledge, February 23rd 2011, to back legal action against Croke Park. This is the awful situation we are in. Croke Park asked for a counter proposal - we prepared one backed by the whole community - and they then ignored us.

Croke Park propose a €9 million White Elephant while GAA Clubs are strapped for cash
It is absolutely extraordinary that Croke Park want to waste so much money on a so-called state of the art handball centre and offices for 40 Handball staff (don't laugh - we can prove this as we insisted on a full recording of the two-day Bord Pleanala hearing) - and this is despite the fact that Handball exploded from two to only 3 staff in the Celtic Tiger years and had a bank balance of just over €900 at the end of 2010. Forty staff would cost circa €2.5m. GAA Handball even recently had to cancel its Congress due to breach of their own rules.

Apparently Croke Park did not like our counter proposal as we said we could provide similar facilities for €3m using one of Croke Park's 3 derelict sites and retaining the existing facility. Ask any delegate - what would you spend on offices for 40, 6 handball alleys and one community room. The writer worked in finance and never have I seen such an incomplete proposal as Croke Park produced - there was no feasibility study or business plan included. Not only that but they had the 60x30 alley turned the wrong way and it had incorrect measurements. It was a fiasco. Check for yourself - Dublin City Council Planning reference 2244/10.

Croke Park Streets Committee Motion - 'Re-claiming our Streets - Croke Park Streets Carnival on day of All-Ireland Final'
Such is the level of discontent within our Community, with Croke Park now seeking to throw our children and old people on to the streets, that there is a motion coming before our AGM that a 'Croke Park Streets Carnival' be organized the day of an All-Ireland Final to teach Croke Park that the streets belong to the people and that the people will be around long after Croke Park is gone.

Now is the time for cool heads and the real community spirit of GAA leadership to manifest itself
The GAA is heading in to difficult times and its current leaders Uachtaran Cooney and PACT Chairman Cawley, respectively FAS executive and ex AIB banker, should appreciate the danger of bulling on ahead and ignoring the realities of their current environment. Our community is a 'significant reality' and Croke Park taking the old landlord bullying approach will see that come back to bite in the end. We are sick of Croke Park's mis-representations and spin and bullying. As a delegate don't be surprised if the day comes when Croke Park will tell you what you may or may not have an opinion on!

We wish Liam O'Neill, the new Uachtaran, every success and we hope his attitude to our community will be more humane and considerate than we have experienced from Croke Park to date. It's time for some core values of community to surface within Croke Park. We have had enough of corporate bullying!

Yours sincerely, Yours sincerely,
Eamon O'Brien Fintan Farrelly
Chairman, Croke Park Streets Committees. Chairman, Handball & Community Centre


Jinxy

'Such is the level of discontent within our Community, with Croke Park now seeking to throw our children and old people on to the streets, that there is a motion coming before our AGM that a 'Croke Park Streets Carnival' be organized the day of an All-Ireland Final to teach Croke Park that the streets belong to the people and that the people will be around long after Croke Park is gone.'

Lord save us.  ::)
If you were any use you'd be playing.

Lar Naparka

I know a good deal about the background to the present crisis at Joseph's Avenue but I'm surprised to see that the protest is being organised by an umbreaal community group.

There has been tension building up since the alleys were built back in the early 70s. At first, the row was between handball interests in Dublin and the authorities at Croke Park. I was an active member of a Dublin handball club and played there several times a week- from the mid-70s up to 2001.The complex was built in for the handballers by the GAA to compensate them for the loss of the old alley which the GAA wanted to demolish in order to re-develop Hill 16.

So far, so good....
A bar was subsequently added with the purpose of generating revenue to cover the running costs of the building. IT soon became obvious that there weren't enough handballers to keep the bar going so a decision wa taken to open the place up to residents.
The blazers at HG were most unhappy but weren't able to block the admission of those who joined a social club based at the bar. They were against any move to open any part of GAA property to outside interests and they wanted their paws on the takings, whereas the complex committee wanted it to develop and enhance the facilities.
An attempt was made to close down the bar and transfer its licence to one of the bars now being planned as part of the stadium's re-vamp. The committee took them to court and won their case.
Blazers now very unhappy bunnies and the handballers shouting "No Surrender!"

HQ promised a new complex out in Donnycarney at Parnell Park as they wanted to turn the present one into a museum. Handballers told them to piss off as they had reneged on promise after promise. Besides, there wasn't a brick laid at Parnell Park and the plans for the new stadium had their complex labelled as the new museum's site.  A move away from their central location would probably mean the demise of handball in Dublin.
Stalemate once more.
Next move from the top brass was to offer a new location under the stand at the Canal End. I was no  longer playing handball and I'm not very sure of what is happening now or for the last ten years or so but I know the handballers were being asked to vacate Joseph's Avenue without a blueprint even of their proposed new base and the locals who used the bar were against the move as it would mean they would have no local.
The social members are almost entirely elderly folks and live in the little streets in the immediate vicinity of their present base.

The bar isn't a sexy place to go at the best of times and barely ticks over during the week. A social committee has been operating for some years past but its activities reflect its membership- a few card games and the likes are about the height of it.
I see the protestors have no linked up with the various residents' associations in the area as I suppose they see strength in numbers.
Unfortunately, the language of the statements issued is very inflammatory and will certainly turn their intended targets off. Both men who signed the statements are dedicated and sincere individuals who are acting from the purest of motives.
However, at least one of them is very excitable and he is inclined to see the bastards coming to get him from all angles.
At a time when cool-heads are needed, he isn't the one I'd choose to lead the protest.
Nil Carborundum Illegitemi

Denn Forever

Who are protesting?

The residents about the traffic disruption when games are on?

The Handball club members?

I am confused.
I have more respect for a man
that says what he means and
means what he says...

Lar Naparka

Quote from: Denn Forever on April 16, 2011, 11:32:58 AM
Who are protesting?

The residents about the traffic disruption when games are on?

The Handball club members?

I am confused.


The short answer is both.

The residents' association in the general area feel they weren't kept fully informed of the extent to which Croke Park was going to be used when they entered into negotiations with the CP authorities.
They feel life is hell for them when the place is staging a big game or a concert: ambulances can't get into the area in the event of an emergency, they are trapped in their own homes as they surrounding streets are blocked, rubbish litters the streets and doors and the likes are used for urinals. They also complain about the noise from concerts.
The number of major events far exceeds what they were originally led to believe when they had talks with the CP authorities.
I think the CP line is that they complied with all planning requirements when the new stadium was being constructed and they obtain licences for anything they stage.
If the residents aren't happy, they should take it up with the city council as CP is staying within the law. It's up to the guards to maintain order and it's the responsibility of Dublin City Council to remove rubbish from the streets.
The handballers fear they are going to be left with nothing if CP has its way. Promise after promise has been broken, they contend. 
This general area can be rough at night and the social members are afraid for their safety if they have to walk along Jones's Road to their new local. That is, if they have a pub to go to. That hasn't been confirmed ASAIK.
Nil Carborundum Illegitemi