Andrew Smith, Western Downs Mayor – Shire update (9 March)

0:00Welcome back to Rural Queensland today, Mayor of the Western Downs Regional Council joins me this morning, Andrew Smith, Bluey Good Morning, some amazing rain in your electorate and obviously in your council, just phenomenal rain, waterlogged these miles and chinchilla and even you're a little bit damp underfoot. Absolutely double, it's been a wonderful 24 to 48 hours across the region. I think our rainfall is sort of filling in because we did have some dry patches but they seem to have picked up some rain over the last 24 to 48 hours but been some phenomenal falls, you know, quite a lot of falls over the 200 mils which is amazing and we'll turn the season around for a lot of our rural landholders. Talk to me about, you know, your, the electorate, it is such a melting point at the moment,

1:00big agriculture, big feed loaning but renewables and trying to get the balance right and we've talked about it. I mean, meetings, we know about the one by one farms you've attended them. Can we get to a place where we get the setbacks changed? Everybody's happy, we get the noise setbacks, the dwelling setbacks changed. I think everybody then gets happy or is it something greater than your council having to try and manage and it needs to go to the state? I guess, Bob, what we have to remember is the planning decisions that are made and the legislation comes from the state. So we, you know, we only have a certain amount of, I guess, voice in the whole, you know, whether it be a debate or development or whatever. There are challenges. There's no doubt about, that there are challenges. You will never keep everybody happy, not everybody's going to be happy at the end of the day.

2:02However, you know, we, we still believe as what came out of the CSG industry and unfortunately we haven't learned, you know, all the lessons that we should have. Coexistence is king. I've got no doubt that we can coexist. It is about getting everything or getting as many of those boxes ticked as possible. And there's still a few bit of work to do. But, you know, we're a very fortunate region as you pointed out this. There's so much going on the energy industry. Our traditional ag basis is flying, but we've got this intensive ag sector as well. We've got cattle feed lots that are just doing great things in their communities. So, a great place to be at the moment, Bobo. Yeah, it certainly is. Can you understand the annoyance of some, countless, and it was done before this LNP government got into power, but it needs to be rectified because people's livelihoods are at risk.

3:10Yeah, look, there are challenges, obviously, one of the big challenges around setbacks when it comes to, you know, I'm pretty sure you're referring to wind farms and renewables. So, that's, you know, that's beyond, I guess, my qualifications. But the government, you know, the pressure is on the government to get those setbacks right. We, you know, always keep in mind there will be some that, you know, one larger setbacks than others that needs to be backed by science, but they need to get it right. And there needs to be surety for landholders because, you know, their landholders that want to be a part of the energy transition, but there are those that don't want to be, and they really need some surety. Yeah, they certainly do. Mate, I've got to talk about housing. You've got a growing population in your, in your electorate, and in the Western Downs Regional

4:10Council municipality. There is more people moving there. There's not vacant houses, rentals are hard to find. It is, and it's hard, you can't get buildings, you can't get trades, costs are going up. But how do you navigate that? You want to grow these cities and you want to grow these towns. So how do you get more houses and make it more attractive to try and get people there? Yeah, but there are only so many levers that we can pull as a local government. One of the ones that we've done, no, I guess one of the costs in developing is around infrastructure charges. The current government have residential activation fund, which councils can apply for, and we've, we were successful in round one. We will certainly be in amongst round two, which helps provide the bigger infrastructure for different developments. The bottom line is, and totally agree, we have housing concerns, I think most regions across

5:17Queensland, even Australia have housing concerns at the moment. We're a growing community, so we probably have as many concerns as others. But the bottom line is, we need developers to come into our region and build houses. Now for them at the moment, it's not that attractive. So that's why we put money on the table in regards to infrastructure charges, and we've basically written a check and it's on the table for five million in the West and down at the moment. But also, as I said, the residential activation fund from the state. So, and I know that that's helping different developments. But it is a challenge. It is a real challenge at the moment. But we are a positive side of it. Dobot is that we're fortunate. We're a growing community. These are growth pains. People want to come to you. People want to come to your community. That's the biggest thing. You know, people want to move out there. That's better than running away

6:17from there in droves. There are people choosing to move out there and go and look, financially and from an opportunity perspective, whether or not it is renewables, whether or not it's more gas, whether or not there's more opportunity in there. The West and Downs is in a very healthy position with a long way forward. How close are you getting to new CEO, mate? Look, we're starting the process, Dobot. We've been really, really fortunate to have our CEO, Jody Taylor, with us for five years. She and her husband Brad, they're going to travel around Australia. Great adventure for them. But yeah, there's an opportunity for us to get another dynamic person to run the operations of Council. So, we're starting that process now. Be a little while before we go to the public. But there is a process that you need to go through here in the local government. Appreciate your time. Have a good day, mate. You won't be able to get out today, but to wet

7:19in your neck of the woods. Oh, it's beautiful, Dobot. 215 mil with measured and we were really dry, proud of that. Yeah, it's good. Andrew Smith, appreciate your time. Thanks so much for being with us this morning on rural coins and today. Cheers, Dobot. Good on you. We're going to take a break. Come back still plenty more to get through across the Resonate Broadcast Network.