http://www.maryrobinsoncentre.ie/the-centre.html
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/ ... -1.2822986
Quote:
Planned library at Mary Robinson’s former home delayed
Brother yet to sell Ballina building where former president’s archive is to be held
Former president Mary Robinson’s brother has yet to sign a deal to sell the family’s ancestral home in Ballina to house Ireland’s first presidential library. This is despite the fact that €6 million of State money has already been allocated to the project and a major campaign is under way in the US to raise millions from private donors.
The €8.35 million Mary Robinson Centre is due to be in Victoria House, a three-storey period property on the banks of the River Moy in Ballina, owned by Ms Robinson’s brother Adrian Bourke. It is currently a solicitor’s office.
Mayo County Council has allocated €1.5 million to buy the property and adjacent lands, but four years after the centre was first announced, the council and Mr Bourke have failed to agree a price.
Freedom of Information documents indicate that Mayo County Council was prepared to pay €665,000 for Victoria House. This was based on a valuation agreed by NUI Galway “for the acquisition of property of strategic value to the University”.
NUI Galway is the academic partner and an enthusiastic supporter of the project.
Mr Bourke did not respond to an emailed list of questions surrounding the sale.
http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/diarm ... -1.2838667
Ferriter fairly takes Robinson to task; however he doesn't mention the owner of the proposed building... presumably for legal reasons?
Quote:
Diarmaid Ferriter: Mary Robinson’s legacy in no need of a vanity project
...
Such an assessment can be made because Ó Dálaigh’s private papers are held in the University College Dublin (UCD) archives, and combined with the State papers in the National Archives, they allow for a detailed analysis and interpretation of the events that led to his resignation. The papers of one of his predecessors as president, Éamon de Valera, are also in the UCD archives, as are the papers of Ó Dálaigh’s successor, Patrick Hillery, which were deposited by Hillery in 1991 and 1997. All collections in the UCD archives are donated without payment of any kind. The current president, Michael D Higgins, donated the archive of his career up to that point to the National Library of Ireland in 2011, also without payment, with the promise of more to come.
However, the papers of Mary Robinson, president in 1990-1997, are heading west to the new Mary Robinson Centre in Ballina, which has an estimated cost of €8.35 million. Mayo County Council, which will hold the papers in trust on behalf of the State, has committed €1.5 million to the centre, while the Department of the Taoiseach will provide €2 million, and this money will reportedly be matched through philanthropic funding.
Robinson’s archive is being assessed for acceptance as a heritage donation; under sections of the Finance Act 1995 and the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997, a tax credit equal to 80 per cent of the market value of the heritage item donated can be credited against tax liabilities incurred by the donor. As the Robinson archive has been valued by Mealy’s auctioneers at €2.5million, this amounts to a possible tax credit of €2 million. Robinson has described this project as a “give back” to the people of Ireland.
The website of the Mary Robinson Centre lists the contents of the archive, including:
“2,000 books on law and Human Rights (many of these presented to Mary Robinson and signed by the author); 3,800 periodicals, many of them with contributions by Robinson; A Master File of the President’s engagements from Dec 1990 to Sept 1997; The symbolic light in the window of Áras an Uachtaráin from Mary’s Presidency; Robinson’s personal diaries from 1967 to 1990 and from 1998 to 2001; 325 Archive Cartons containing documents ranging from the Anglo Irish Agreement to Women and Equality . . .”
Whether these items are worth €2.5 million is arguable, but equally troubling is that an auction house ever had to be involved in the calculation of the material value in the private market of an archive of a former head of state. And why is a “master file” of the president’s engagements not the property of the State? If Robinson wants to encourage research into her career, or assessments of her legacy, she should follow the practice of her predecessors and donate her papers to the National Library, the National Archives or one of the national universities, without any need for tax credits or valuations by auctioneers and with no excessively expensive, publicly funded vanity centre.
Robinson is a former groundbreaking politician and head of state, in receipt of a very large annual pension from the public purse, being paid €121,158 last year. Her public service should extend to the donation of her archive in the proper sense, continuing a noble tradition.
sounds like the Bourke/Robinsons are a bit like the Clintons - ostensibly concerned with the public good but always seem to make out like bandits on the back of their concerns
Statistics: Posted by slasher — Sun Oct 23, 2016 1:03 pm