McDonnell receives high praise on home turf

Anton McNulty

There was not a bad word to be said about the outgoing Cathaoirleach of Mayo County Council, Cllr Al McDonnell with councillors lavishing him with praise at his penultimate meeting.
The Fianna FΡil councillor welcomed councillors to his home turf in the Carnacon Parish Centre where the June monthly meeting of Mayo County Council was held yesterday (Monday).
Traditionally the June meeting of the County Council is held in the home parish of the outgoing Cathaoirleach and Cllr McDonnell and the local community council pulled out all the stops with a meal served after the meeting.
At the start of the meeting, Cllr McDonnell welcomed his colleagues to Carnacon and he praised the local community council for all their hard work in advance of the meeting. He also remembered some of the former councillors from the area including Patrick Quinn, SeΡn Nestor and Tim Quinn and praised their commitment to the area.
Cllr McDonnell recently celebrated 30 years as a councillor and has acted as Cathaoirleach of the council on two occasions.
Speaking on behalf of Carnacon Development Association, Walter Hughes, Chairman,  praised Cllr McDonnell for his 30 years of service as a councillor to the area.
“Al is highly respected in the area and is from an established and respected family in the area. He is an astute politician. We would ask him for something and he would never say ‘yes’ but he would say he would look into it. But he usually delivered. Al has served the community well for over 30 years, I’m not saying the other councillors didn’t either, but it is Al’s day,” he joked.
Councillors from all political parties praised both Cllr McDonnell’s 30 years of community service as a councillor along with his year as a councillor.
Erris-based Fine Gael councillor Gerry Coyle said that he would never forget the support given by Cllr McDonnell to him during the Corrib gas controversy and added he would find it hard to vote against him in favour of a party colleague if there was a contest for Cathaoirleach. Chief Executive, Peter Hynes described Cllr McDonnell as an ‘absolute gentleman’ who was ‘held in high regard and rightly so’.