Mayor to seek city status for Tralee with motion

Tralee, the county town of Kerry, looks set to seek city status, with a formal motion seeking city designation by the current mayor being put before the Municipal District of Tralee meeting on Monday.

Fianna Fail Cllr Thomas McEllistrim, who is the current cathaoirleach or mayor of Tralee, said city status for Tralee was one of his priorities when elected as mayor and there was no good reason, as far as he was concerned, why it should not be effected.

“On population grounds alone why shouldn’t Tralee be designated a city when Kilkenny is?” Cllr McEllistrim said.

The population of Kilkenny is 23,000; that of Tralee at the last census was 22,200, Mr McEllistrim said.

Conferring city status on Tralee, the county town, would have several advantages.

“It would make a big difference to Tralee from a tourism point of view. People tend to go to cities.”

Education would also benefit with university status especially more likely if Tralee were a city, and it would be entitled to additional funding under the Living City and other initiatives.

However, according to a spokesman for the Department of Environment and Local Government the move for city status for Tralee would require legislation.

The trend of late has seen “a streamlining of local government where town councils were abolished and various municipal districts have been established,” the spokesman said.

The various Local Government Legislative Acts have historically set out which councils are city councils and which ones are county councils, although recently the two local authorities in Limerick and Waterford have merged.

There have been no proposals to confer city status on any other councils, the spokesman said