Mayor's Message - Council Connections 13 January 2018

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year everybody!  May it be full of happiness, success and all that you hope for.  You deserve it.

Council’s staff are mainly all back at work.  Thank you to our skeleton crews that worked throughout the Christmas period in keeping the essential services going, enabling the rest of staff to take a well-earned break.

One of our early priorities this year will be to clean and tidy up the waterfall and creek area of our Botanical Gardens.  This area has not been looked after for a long, long time due to the bat epidemic, but we cannot allow such a terrible look to continue.  We are working hard to make our district an enviable destination of choice and to improve our liveability and the current visual state of this area does not do much to assist that cause.

Just to give you an idea of what Council is up against due to the flying fox roost, below is a short summary of some of the rules we must abide by in conducting the clean-up operations: 

• Council may undertake low impact activities without a permit – low impact activities include mulching, mowing, or weeding under or near roost trees and or minor trimming of roost trees, where the activities are not directed at destroying a roost or driving away, or disturbing a flying fox in a flying fox roost.
• no roost tree may be trimmed when there are flying foxes in the tree.
• where low impact activities are required to be undertaken during the day time, works must immediately cease and the Department of Environment and Heritage Protection immediately notified if 30% or more of the adult flying foxes leave the roost for five minutes or more.

It’s going to take a while…..

Hard Rubbish Support Program 2018

Hinchinbrook Shire Council, in partnership with the Hinchinbrook Community Support Centre, will be providing a Hard Rubbish Support Program for eligible residents. The program is intended to assist people who are otherwise unable to remove large items from their home.

The hard rubbish support program offered in previous years has been fundamental in assisting those in our community who are otherwise unable to access Council’s waste facilities. The Hinchinbrook Shire Council and the Hinchinbrook Community Support Centre are pleased to offer this program again. This waste initiative is part of a host of waste initiatives offered by Council including the Rural Cleanup, the beach bulk bins over peak holiday periods, and the virtual voucher system. All of these initiatives help to keep the Hinchinbrook Shire beautiful and protect the Great Barrier Reef.

Acceptable hard rubbish includes white goods, furniture (such as tables, chairs, wardrobes, shelving units), beds/mattresses, large electronic waste (such as televisions, computers), batteries, and any waste as may be deemed acceptable upon registration with Hinchinbrook Community Support Centre.

Unacceptable waste includes green waste, household waste (such as food and other waste able to be disposed of in wheelie bins), car bodies, chemicals and flammable liquids, tyres, building and construction material.

To enquire as to eligibility for the program and registration, please contact the Hinchinbrook Community Support Centre on 4776 1822 between 15 January 2018 and 9 February 2018.

Works Program

If you are interested in knowing where Council will be undertaking work as part of its Capital Works Program for the rest of the financial year, then go to the Current Works page on Council’s website www.hinchinbrook.qld.gov.au.  Full details, including costs associated with such works, are available for your perusal.

Cr Ramon Jayo

Mayor

Don’t forget we have the World’s best backyard to celebrate Australia Day in, so get out and about and enjoy the unique experiences that our region has to offer!

Photograph by Quinn Lawson Photography