Madam, – We agree with the sentiment of Orna Mulcahy’s article (Opinion, June 5th, “Fine weather no excuse for nation’s filthy behaviour”), but would point out that during the period of hot weather this month our volunteers were out in Sandycove every morning helping council staff clean the seafront.
At the start of the month, Sandycove retained the Green Coast Award from An Taisce for the fifth year in succession.
With the help and assistance of the Dun Laoghaire Beaches Department we removed dozens of bags of rubbish left in the general vicinity of the beach. Not only was there public drinking going on but drug-taking in the evenings in the small park. The trail of rubbish stretched from Sandycove Dart Station through the village and seafront to the beach each day.
The gardaí were present from mid afternoon onwards on each of the warm days. They confiscated a large amount of alcohol and kept the peace. They had their hands full. Three years ago when we had our last spell of good weather gardaí were assaulted at Sandycove beach. They have done an excellent job in containing the situation on the beach where there were large numbers of young people.
Our work is by no means confined to hanging baskets and sweeping in front of shops, as Ms Mulcahy suggests. The village, surrounding area and seafront were pristine as a result of combined hard work of the council staff and our volunteers in preparation for Bloomsday which attracts thousands of visitors to the area. – Yours, etc,