Outgoing Provost Helen Moonie and former South Ayrshire Council leader Douglas Campbell gave farewell speeches at their final meeting before May’s elections.
Councillor Campbell (SNP) talked about his work with individuals and community groups in his Ayr North ward.
He began with a story about the renovation work carried out on the High Flats in Ayr, which are set for demolition.
And he explained that one election had been fought on the subject of improving the Riverside Place properties, which saw the buildings recladded.
Cllr Campbell described a meeting that was held with tenants at St Margaret’s Cathedral.
One older resident, he said, had complained that the council had changed the colour of the cladding to salmon pink without telling residents.
He went on: “She said, ‘I’m no staying in a pink house’. The lady next to her then said she wasn’t staying in a green house.”
Cllr Campbell said that an officer went to the council offices to get an example of the panels.
“When he came back," he continued, "she said, ‘that’s lovely’ and there was round of applause.”
Cllr Campbell, who was a Labour councillor until 2008, and an SNP councillor from 2011, said he also wanted to pay tribute to a group of mums in the Lochside area of the town.
He said: “There was a group of mums in Mackie Street and McLean Street. There was a great deal of stigma in Lochside due to drug dealing and drug misuse.
“We worked with them over many weeks and months. In four years they drove out drug dealing in that area of Lochside. I would like to pay tribute to them.”
Provost Moonie, a Labour member, spoke more broadly on her career, having first been elected in 2003.
She said: “Coming from a highly-political left-wing family, I was determined never to enter politics. But politics has strange way of sucking you in and, sometimes, spitting you out.
“It very quickly dawned on me that there were 15 of us on the Labour group and I was the only woman. No worries, I thought, this will be a pushover.
“I have experienced the best support, friendship and respect from the Labour group and councillors across the political spectrum.
“Some believe that all political careers end in failure. I believe that if you have always tried hard and leave things better than they were, you can never be a failure.”
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