Unique approach to people with special needs on island

THE gift of a site by Gaelic football legend Mick O’Connell and his wife, Rosaleen, has helped provide Valentia, Co Kerry, with a €1.2 million home for six people with special needs who from the area.

Located close to the O’Connell family home on the island, Tig an Oileáin, overlooks the Atlantic with the spectacular Sceilig Mhichil and the Great Blasket Island in the distance.

A local committee, under the chairmanship of Donal O’Donoghue, helped raise €600,000 and grants from the Department of the Environment and other statutory bodies made up the balance of the cost.

“There was tremendous support locally for the project and we also got a lot of backing from people in other countries. You could say it’s been going on since 1997,” said Mr O’Connell, whose son, Diarmuid, is one of the six residents of the home.

A Dutch benefactor also assisted and enlisted the aid of 60 colleagues to work on the project.

Each resident has private living quarters and the purpose-built facility has been visited by people from other parts of the country and could yet become a model for similar facilities elsewhere in the country. Residents occupy themselves in a number of ways and look after a variety of pets such as donkeys and rabbits.

“What it really means to the residents is that they have a home of their own and do not have to move from post to pillar. It’s a home for their lifetime,” Mr O’Connell explained.

He also paid tribute to the Kerry Parents and Friends and its chief executive Tony Darmody.

Roslaeen O’Connell has been given much of the credit for seeing the project through from beginning to end.

“This centre is getting away from institutional thinking and bringing people back to where they belong,” she said.

Tig an Oileáin also has day care facilities.

It was officially opened by Tourism Minister John O’Donoghue and blessed by Bishop Bill Murphy of Kerry and Bishop Michael Mayes, Church of Ireland.

Bishop Murphy said that, in a time when society was becoming selfish and materialistic, it was very rewarding to such a project being brought to completion.

The project also showed an enlightened attitude to people with disabilities.