Thank you message to staff
The start of December saw, in the words of the Met Office, a unique weather event. The ice that formed on roads and pavements, open spaces and pathways across Moray, in places rarely previously affected, and for the length of time it lasted, was unprecedented. We want to record our thanks to all employees who continued to provide the people of Moray with our services throughout an extremely challenging time.
The covid-19 pandemic showed we are able to cope under extreme circumstances but no-one wants that to be tested quite as regularly as it seems to be just now! We know how dedicated our staff are and last week by showing up, volunteering to help with gritting, and getting on with the job at hand was a fantastic example of that level of dedication.
Teachers, school, catering and cleaning staff determined to keep our schools open after so many interrupted terms in recent years; carers making their way to the homes of their service users; the waste team fulfilling collection schedules and battling to keep recycling centres open; the contact centre for processing the additional volume of correspondence coming in; all staff who made the journey to their place of work or worked from home to keep traffic levels down. You all deserve our thanks and gratitude, but perhaps none more so than the gritting teams who regularly put themselves in danger as some of the first on untreated roads as they make their way round Moray to keep us as safe as possible. The whole roads team, Open Spaces crews who moved over to assist and the community justice team, who also provided boots on the ground, are to be thanked for their efforts under circumstances many of us have never experienced before.
While we hope we don’t need to step up a response like that again, we’re much reassured by our ability to react to whatever winter throws at us and we give thanks, on behalf of Moray Council, to you all once again.
Roddy Burns, Chief Executive and Kathleen Robertson, Cllr Leader