The local elections took place on the 7th of June with 40 seats on Fingal County Council up for election. The Rush-Lusk local election area is one of seven LEA’s in Fingal and saw the election of five Councillors. Heading the poll was Cllr Rob O’Donoghue with 3,185 first preference votes and being deemed elected on the first count for his second five-year term on the Council.

Speaking about the results, Councillor O’Donoghue stated, ‘I would like to say thank you to the people of Rush for your support in the Local Elections. I am genuinely overwhelmed at receiving 26% of first preference votes in the constituency. I am going to continue to work hard for all my constituents and will be available as always for any issues large or small. I would like in particular to thank my canvassers, leafleters and posterers with which I would never have been able to cover the ground that we did, I am eternally grateful for their support.

There is a lot of work to do in the coming Council terms and there are a number of projects that I would like to see continue to be progressed in Rush including, the Rush Sports Hub, the Rush Town Centre First Plan and to aid in the delivery of school facilities for the town. I look forward to representing the town for the duration of the term to the very best of my ability.’

The members of the Rush Parent and Toddler Group move into their summer break after a very eventful 2023/2024 and the children, and parents, are now enjoying their holidays.

From season-themed events to their weekly activities in the Rush Community Centre, the toddlers have had an exciting year. Sarah Smith from Rush Parent & Toddler group gave a brief outline of the year and how other parents can get their toddlers involved.

“We’ve had various other events over the course of the 23/24 year including a Halloween box fort, First Aid course, the Santa van and bauble making crafts at Christmas, and giant hearts for Valentines Day.”
“We do ask a donation of €4 per family to cover room rental at the Community Centre and insurance costs. We provide tea, coffee and biscuits for adults and small snacks for the babies and toddlers. We meet most Tuesdays from 10am to 12pm in Room 2 at the Community Center,” Sarah added.

It was an absolute privilege and honour to represent the town of Rush, the wider Rush / Lusk Ward and previously the Balbriggan Ward on Fingal County Council over the last ten years. I would like to thank the residents and voters for the engagement and support during my period as a public representative. I would in particular like to thank my family, team of canvassers and helpers for their support both throughout the years while on the Council, as well as with the recent election campaign which would have started on the Dublin/Meath border a few months ago.

I would like to take the opportunity to wish the recently elected Rush / Lusk Ward Councillors Robert O Donoghue, Corina Johnston, Cathal Boland, Eoghan Dockrell and Paul Mulville all the best as they take up their new positions and in particular the new first time elected Councillors.

Getting elected and failing to get re-elected are just different sides of the same coin in some respects in politics and you have to take the good days with the bad.

I am currently involved in multiple community organisations in and around the town of Rush, it is my intention to remain involved, with the intention of contesting future elections as they arise. In the meantime, I will be monitoring what I would call the several ‘work in progress’ projects which I had been working on in the background, an example of which would be the purchase by Fingal County Council of the 28-acre site as a community resource in Knockdromin House adjacent to the Rush / Lusk train station.
I would also like to take the opportunity to express my commiserations to my hard-working colleague Adrian Henchy current Mayor of Fingal County Council and wish him and his family all the best going forward.

Rush 38th Cubs recently ventured to Roscommon on their annual camp. Roving reporter and Cub Scout “Sixer” Maeve Doherty is here to tell us all about it, “As a member of the Rush 38th cubs I can tell you the camp, which started on the 31st of May and ended on the 3rd of June, was certainly one to remember. On the Friday evening after school, 30 excited cubs boarded a very noisy three-hour bus drive to Lough Key, Roscommon. Then, we walked to our camp site where a delicious bag of chicken nuggets and chips awaited each of us. The theme of the camp for this year was “Pirates of the Caribbean”. Camp lasted for three nights, and every single day was filled with joy, and excitement. We did lots of activities including admiring the peaceful view of Lough Key while we also had the opportunity to get on the water and go rowing with the ducks. We also went on a gorgeous tree canopy walk. On our walk we learned about Rockingham House, which was designed by the same person who designed Buckingham palace. We also learned that the house burned down in a house fire while the owners were away. A tall building has been put up to mark were the house once stood. We got to climb to the top of the building to see the gorgeous view. We also went through the servant tunnels and through basement. After that we went on a boat tour of the lake while also singing karaoke. On the second day of camp, we went to Boda Borg which is a collection of escape rooms. The rooms were very challenging, but we all had a great time there. At the end of the day, we had a super fun disco with lights and great music. We even let other scout troops at the camp site join in. We all had a great time at camp all thanks to our amazing leaders who looked after us and made the camp so fun.”

River Clean-Up

What a National Biodiversity Week project! Well done to the residents of St Catherine’s Estate who along with members of the 38th Rush Scout Group, members of Rush Tidy Towns and our local Councillors Brian and Rob came together to clear a load of debris out of the river which runs along the edge of the Estate and which eventually makes its way into the sea. Fingal County Council were also very prompt at coming to pick up the proceeds of the clean-up.

Anchor Square Clean-Up

Thank you to all the Rush Tidy Towns volunteers who came along to the big clean up of the Anchor Square in June. It was quite the transformation.

Africa Day was the opportunity for Lusk Community Council to launch it’s new podcast, Listen Up Lusk, which is now available on Spotify. The inaugural podcast hosted by Akintunde Idowu features interviews with the Mayor of Fingal, Adrian Henchy, Minister Joe O’Brien, Pastor Habeeb Goodluck, Dr. Sarah Taaffe and the Akano Rythm Brothers. The podcast discussion covers what it means to be Mayor of Fingal, the role of Africa Day, multiculturalism, work in Africa and the role that music can play in bringing communities together.

Listen Up Lusk will be used to give voice to community ideas, innovations and important stories for the town. Over the coming months we will be particularly working with our young people in the town to share their thoughts and ideas.

The local elections took place on the 7th of June with 40 seats on Fingal County Council up for election. The Rush-Lusk local election area is one of seven LEA’s in Fingal and saw the election of five Councillors. Heading the poll was Cllr Rob O’Donoghue with 3,185 first preference votes and being deemed elected on the first count for his second five-year term on the Council.

Speaking about the results, Councillor O’Donoghue stated, ‘I would like to say thank you to the people of Lusk for your support in the Local Elections. I am genuinely overwhelmed at receiving 26% of first preference votes in the constituency. I am going to continue to work hard for all my constituents and will be available as always for any issues large or small. I would like in particular to thank my canvassers, leafleters and posterers with which I would never have been able to cover the ground that we did, I am eternally grateful for their support.

There is a lot of work to do in the coming Council terms and there are a number of projects that I would like to see continue to be progressed in Lusk including, the Lusk Sports Hub currently seeking planning permission from An Bord Pleanala, the Lusk Town Centre First Plan which was published in May and to ensure the sustainable development of the town. I look forward to representing Lusk for the duration of the term to the very best of my ability.’

Summer is here and this is an opportunity to say a big thank you to our hardworking coaches who should now be taking a well-deserved break after a hectic few months. Congratulations to our juvenile relay teams on their recent success and after Ireland’s fabulous performances at the European Championships we expect relay events to be even more popular. Well done to everyone who has participated in some of the many races and field events that have taken place over the last few months. Registration is now open for the 7k Man O’War Round on 15th August. This is becoming more popular each year so sign up soon to avoid disappointment.

Our 50th Anniversary Celebration Dinner Dance kicked off at the Bracken Court Hotel in Balbriggan on Saturday 8th June.

Club chairman, John Spencer started proceedings by thanking the current Committee and Niall McGuinness, Ryan Fagan, Sean Compton and Carrieanne Spencer for their help in organising this prestigious event.

There were two guest speakers on the night. First up was former player, manager and chairman, Mr. John Fullam who gave a witty trip down memory lane up to present day. He gave thanks to the Club’s long-term sponsor’s The Yacht Bar and Gerry’s Fresh Food’s Supermarket.

Second guest speaker was Irish Olympic Boxing silver medalist Mr. Kenneth Egan who gave a wonderful motivational speech about his journey from young boxer to the Beijing Olympic podium.

Music on the night came from local band 2 Minute Drive of which Stu and Steve Cash are former players. Rounding off the night DJ Cathal Guinan ensured the dancefloor stayed full with some great tunes.
Loughshinny Utd was formed on the 10th June 1974. Our first chairman was George Tolan and early managers were Nicky Cash, Mick Kenny and Paddy Ryan who all laid the foundations for future success.
The Club’s first silverware came on the 5th May 1979 at the Iveagh Grounds when we defeated a talented Johnson Mooney and O’Brien side 5 – 0 with Club legend Ciaran Rogan RIP bagging a brace. The victorious manager was Liam Matthews RIP.

The late 80’s saw the Club really take off. Richard Ferguson invited a certain John Fullam to play a 5aside tournament at the Fair Maid of Fingal Festival and Fullam liked what he saw. John made a few shrewd signings and enlisted one Gerry Butler and together they catapulted the Club to the dizzy heights of Intermediate Leinster Senior League football. It cannot be overstated how big an achievement this was for a village the size of Loughshinny. This was a golden period culminating in the Club’s finest hour. On the 26th July 2003, they took on the might of Galway Utd in the first round of the FAI Cup. Although beaten 2 – 0 on the day, they certainly weren’t outclassed.

There were many trophies, promotions and leagues won over the years by our juvenile and senior sides with many successful managers. Our last success came when Kevin Wynne’s senior side took the AUL Division 3 league title.

The Club were also blessed to have the services of Carmel Fanning and Deirdre Ferguson RIP for many years. These two ladies worked tirelessly, and their off-field work will never be forgotten.

Unfortunately, we could not field a senior team this season, but we are always on the lookout for senior players to get it back up and running. Our junior teams are thriving and we plan to expand from four teams to seven this year and run another Junior academy for 5 and 6-year-olds.

If you are interested in joining Loughshinny Utd, we would be delighted to welcome you down. We are looking for boys or girls born between 2012 to 2019 and any senior players for our men’s side. Please contact John on 087-7101612

Last month saw our third Lusk Summer Festival and what a day it was! The Summer Festival is a day for bringing the whole community together with music, food, fun and so much to see and do. It gives us great satisfaction to see all our hard work pay off. We would like to once again thank Fingal County Council for all of their support; Progressive Credit Union for their generous sponsorship, OLIVER marketing for providing our signs and posters, our business donators, our amazing organising committee, all the volunteers who turned up on the day, Bentley Bros for their support, our wonderful musicians and groups and of course our own DJ Joe for keeping us all entertained. The list is endless so we would like to thank everyone who helped us and supported us in making the day such a success.

We would like to congratulate all of our re-elected councillors and also some new ones. In particular we would like to thank LAG member Cllr Robert O’Donoghue for his tireless work on behalf of our community over the last 5 years. We are very fortunate to have him advocating for us and delighted that he is still in a position to do so. Many congratulations to him and to our other elected local representatives and MEPs.

Last month, LAG members met with Go Ahead to discuss continued bus service concerns. We have collated information gathered from the community and will continue to feed back to Go Ahead. They are working on corrective measures, but we continue to seek your feedback. Contact us on luskactiongroup@gmail.com and Go Ahead on customercomment@goaheadireland.ie Include as much detail as possible including bus stop number, time, issue etc.

LAG is looking for community feedback regarding low flying planes, especially over Rahenny Park. Please get in touch with us at the email above.

There are further delays in a response from An Bord Pleanala regarding our mobile mast appeals. This is due to a large backlog. We will update the community as soon as we have any information.