Ridgepool Hotel re-opens

Jobs boost as hotel reopens

Anna-Marie Flynn

SEVERAL former employees have returned to work at Ballina’s Ridgepool Hotel where the first guests are due to arrive this Thursday.
The riverside premises has been transformed with an extensive €20,000 revamp carried out throughout in time for the doors to officially reopen tomorrow (Wednesday).
General Manager Ronald Marks told The Mayo News that while a number of former employees have applied to work in the hotel, the response from former workers was not ‘huge’. He attributed this to the nature of the industry where many of the workers are already established in other employment. He said that from his staff of 12 in the accommodation department, five former employees have been taken on, including two porters, a receptionist and a maintenance worker. He said he was not aware of the numbers re-employed in the bar and restaurant which are under separate lease arrangements.
“We have taken on as many people as possible from the previous staff. Where people have applied we have made every attempt to facilitate them and, of course, we are still welcoming job applications,” he said.
Mr Marks said the accommodation will be open for business from midweek and the bar and restaurant will be in operation in time for next weekend. Function room facilities and the leisure centre are due to be overhauled over the next month.
Assistant Officer with SIPTU, Tommy Ginley, said he was ‘thrilled’ to hear former employees are being reinstated following the distressing uncertainty over its future just a couple of months ago.
“At the time the Ridgepool closed I was given an undertaking that former workers would be taken on again should the business reopen as a hotel. Obviously there was no legal obligation for anything to happen once people were made redundant so I am very happy to hear that these assurances have now become a reality.”

Ballina business group to save seaside hotel

THE business consortium behind The Ridgepool Hotel in Ballina has saved another tourism magnet with the take-over of a sea-side premises eight miles outside the town yesterday (Monday).
The Ocean Sands Hotel in Enniscrone closed last Tuesday evening after less than six months in operation, but the hotel was reopened yesterday under new management. Staff were informed of the closure immediately before the doors were closed for business last Tuesday and notification of its reopening was posted on the door two days later.
The Mayo News has learned that the three-member business group behind the Ridgepool Hotel reopening has stepped in to save the four-star, 56-bedroom hotel in time for the summer season.
Ocean Sands was built by local developer Mark Devaney at Main Street in the town last year.