Elections 2024: Over 50 candidates battling it out for 21 seats in metropolitan area
THE SCENE is set in the metropolitan district with a total of 52 candidates hoping to win one of the 21 seats up for grabs.
Three wards, with seven seats each, City West, City East and City North represent the urban population as well as some satellite villages like Patrickswell, Castleconnell and Montpelier.
Back in the days of the old City Council, with its four wards, a few hundred votes would see you across the line. It's more difficult now, with those at the top of the poll going into four figures.
The story of the last election in the metropolitan district was the emergence of the Green Party, returning two councillors - Brian Leddin, now a TD, in North and Sean Hartigan in East.
They came mighty close to electing a third, Breandán MacGabhann in City West.
The beneficiary of this made history himself, Azad Talukder becoming the first Muslim councillor elected in Limerick.
Sinn Fein’s vote imploded - they went from six council seats to just two, its sole gain in City North, in a bad election for the party.
As a result of this, there was a hung council, with Fine Gael and Fianna Fail dividing up the civic leadership roles among their councillors.
One candidate will not be standing again this time - the former mayor James Collins, FF, who topped the poll in City West back in 2019.
It will be interesting to see where his first preference vote (1,375 in 2019) will go, with Fine Gael’s Daniel Butler just 59 votes behind him last time.
Across in City East, another former mayor, Cllr Michael Sheahan is on the move to Adare-Rathkeale in the rural area, leaving a chunk of votes in Castletroy and Monaleen.
The Social Democrats made a breakthrough at the 2019 local election, Elisa O’Donovan securing a seat in City West.
She is running again in this constituency and the party is also contesting City North with Shane Hickey-O’Meara, and Donnah Vuma in City East.
When one writes about Fianna Fail in local politics, there is often the added dimension of the rivalry between the party’s TDs, Niall Collins and Willie O’Dea.
With Cllr Collins - a cousin of Niall’s - out of the running, the majority of Fianna Fail’s council hopefuls in the metropolitan area are now aligned to the former Defence Minister, city-based Mr O’Dea.
Fine Gael is running multiple candidates in each of the three city areas.
They will hope to emulate their performance in City East, where three from four were returned last time out.
Notably, the party did not do as well as it hoped in City North and City West, where it lost sitting councillors.
Buoyed by some positive opinion polling, Sinn Fein has significantly upped the number of candidates it is running across the city, with local TD Maurice Quinlivan saying recently he hoped to double the party’s numbers on council.
But it remains to be seen how a recent contraction in the party's polling at the expense of Fine Gael will play out on June 7 and the days that follow.