Sarah Ryan, daughter of Fianna Fáil MEP Eoin Ryan, was co-opted onto Dublin City Council in May 2008. Sarah is the the fourth generation of her family to serve as a public representative. Her grandfather was Senator Eoin Ryan, and great-grandfather, Dr Jim Ryan, who was a minister in the governments of Eamon de Valera and Sean Lemass. Sarah beat off serious competition to take the Fianna Fáil seat.

Sarah studied history, has fluent Irish and after completing a Masters from the Smurfit Business School works now as a Business consultant. She has also worked as a teacher in CBS Westland Row and a Dublin 4 taxi firm.

She told me that she does not have any aspirations to run for the Dáil seat but says “I feel that it is very important to have a strong understanding of local politics behind you” and says she has enough to do with the business consultancy company that she works for and the Council work to keep her going without building ambitions for the Oireachtas. She did help her father in his election campaign in the past and was active in Ógra Fianna Fáil.

Talking to her out on the seafront at Sandymount, she says her biggest asset as a Dublin South East area Councillor is her upbringing in the district. “I grew up here in Bath Avenue and still live in Sandymount and regularly walked along the Strand, I know the place from living and working here,” she says.

She is not so comfortable with the proposals from the Dublin Docklands Development Authority for the Poolbeg peninsula and hopes to see the wild birds’ habitat protected and limitations on development. She says she hopes that the DDDA will respond properly to the public consultation process and respect the nature reserve SPA. “I’m a big fan of the Finnish architect Eliel Saarinen who said ‘always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context, a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan’.”

Sarah Ryan is “pro business” and believes in commonsense policies and politics as this is in keeping with her work and she says she still has cocerns for her former workplace, the CBS school, where the building needs modernising. Cllr. Ryan has now to hold on to her seat at the forthcoming local elections, expected sometime in June 2009. The Local Election Boundary Committee has recommended a transfer of the electoral divisions of Pembroke West A and Pembroke East B to the South-East Inner City electoral area. As a result, the South-East Inner City electoral area will have a total population of 40,028 with four Council seats.

Her campaign message is about her love for her home town She says “Dublin is a wonderful city and while I’ve had the privilege to travel I always love coming back to it. This area in particular is full of history and wonderful natural environments between the Canal and the seafront. I’m proud of my city and its people, and its not a surprise that it is so popular as a destination for people all over the world.”