Did the council follow the correct process to name Herzog Park back in 1995?

In October 1994, the Municipality of Jerusalem wrote to Dublin Corporation asking that Dublin celebrate the “City of David’s” tri-millennium, which was coming up in 1996.

Jerusalem requested Dublin name a street, square, or park in its honour. 

Dublin city councillors swiftly decided to rename what was then known as Orwell Quarry Park in Rathgar as Herzog Park – for Chaim Herzog, who was born in Dublin and later became President of Israel between 1983 and 1993.

At the time, this wasn’t a big deal, says Mary Freehill, who was then a Dublin city councillor for the Labour Party, and involved in the process.

“I can't remember the precise details, but I certainly tell you that I'm absolutely satisfied that there was no conflict. It was all very cordial,” Freehill said by phone on Tuesday.

Similarly, Labour Councillor Dermot Lacey, who was first elected in 1993 remembers there being no fuss.

The “fuss” came three decades later, when councillors attempted to rename the park, removing mention of Herzog.

The proposal worked its way through council committees, before making it to the agenda of the full council’s December monthly meeting on Monday. 

Ahead of the meeting, there was public condemnation from the US, Israel, and the Taoiseach, among others.

Then, Dublin City Council’s chief executive, Richard Shakespeare, got a call from the secretary general of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, asking him whether he was sure what was being proposed was legally sound, Shakespeare said at the meeting Monday.

After some research, consultation and thought, on Sunday night, he said, Shakespeare informed councillors that the proposal to rename the park should be withdrawn, citing problems with procedure. 

A debate ensued among councillors over whether the proper procedures had been followed, whether councillors had been given correct guidance, and whether the legal advice they were being given at the meeting was correct.

In the end, the council voted to back a motion from Lord Mayor Ray McAdam, a Fine Gael councillor, to withdraw the proposed renaming and send it back to the naming and commemorations committee on 15 December.

Sinn Féin Councillor Micheál Mac Donncha said he wanted the committee to get independent legal advice. So the debate continues about whether the council followed correct procedures in its attempt to overwrite the name Herzog Park.

But did it follow correct procedure in its attempt to rename the amenity to make it Herzog Park in the first place, back in 1994 and 1995, or has Rathgar been living with Orwell Quarry Park all this time?

The process they followed

Soon after the request from Jerusalem arrived, it was raised at the meeting of the Protocol & Selection Committee, held on 14 October 1994, according to council minutes held in Pearse Street Library archive.

It’s unclear from the minutes who suggested Herzog Park.

The order was to “recommend to Council that the park at Orwell Road be named Hertzog Park”.

That recommendation then came before the City Council on 7 November 1994. An amendment by Freehill was carried referring the item back to the Protocol and Selection Committee, minutes say.

“Views of local councillors to be obtained and put before a future meeting of the committee,” it was then ordered.

The proposal then returned to the Protocol and Selection Committee on 7 April 1995. At that time, the committee ordered that the park should be named Herzog Park.

On the 12 June 1995, the name was officially adopted by the council 

Freehill and Lacey both say they don’t remember any other voting or plebiscites undertaken at the time, and the minutes don’t mention them. 

Whether or not a plebiscite would have been required, depends on definitions.

Did it need a plebiscite?

A spokesperson for the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage outlined the laws and regulations that would have been in place at the time of the renaming in 1995.

Placename changes were provided for in sections 76 to 79 of the Local Government Act 1946, as amended by follow-up acts in 1955 and again in 1994, they said.

They lay out what the procedures are for different kinds of places, but don’t specifically mention “parks”. 

Places defined in the 1946 act included a locality and a street, though.

The 1946 act defines a locality as an area, not a street, which is a portion of a county or borough or urban district or town for which a separate name is in common use.

The 1946 and 1955 act defined “street” as including “part of a street and also the whole or part of any road, square, lane or other public place”.

Could either of these include a park? 

If so, to change the name of a street or locality, there needed to be a vote, show the laws at the time.

The 1994 act, meanwhile, defined who should vote on renaming streets and localities, among other places – citing “qualified electors”, meaning registered voters and ratepayers.

In the early 2000s, the council held a plebiscite on whether to change the name of what was Corporation Street to James Joyce Street – in which there were two qualified voters. 

But it’s a bit unclear, from the regulations on voting procedures in place at the time of the Herzog Park renaming, who would vote in relation to a park, if a vote were necessary.

As Freehill, the former Labour councillor, sees it, a plebiscite would have been necessary if it was to do with roads where people are living, she said by phone on Thursday. 

But “there were no residents in the park whose permission was needed, or opinions”, she said.

Another issue she raises is whether or not it had an official name before Herzog Park, she says – in which case the procedure would have been that of a first naming not a change.

The council website says it was "renamed" in 1995 from Orwell Quarry Park. Minutes for the contemporary council meetings refer to it as the "park at Orwell Road".

Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme.