The South Burnett Regional Council has awarded $12,236.30 to nine community groups and two athletes.
The groups were all successful in the first round of the SBRC’s Community Assistance program, which took applications in August this year.
The successful applicants were:
- Kingaroy and District Ministry Association
- Hivesville QCWA
- Tablelands Public Hall Association
- Proston State School P&C
- South Burnett Pantry
- Wooroolin Lions Club
- Murgon and District Military History Association
- Nanango Golf Club
- Proston Community Kitchen Group
The Council also awarded two Elite Performance Grants to athletes Sue Maynard and Shelley Allen to help defray their costs travelling to sporting competitions.
Mayor Wayne Kratzmann said he believed community organisations and volunteers were the lifeblood of the area and he was delighted Council was able to help these groups continue their good works.
He encouraged the region’s many other community groups to apply for Round 2 of the grants program when it opens in February 2013.
Information about the Community Assistance program can be found on the Council’s website.
Residents Must Check Water Meters
South Burnett ratepayers who want to avoid excess water charges will need to check their water meters regularly after the Council changed a clause in its Undetected Water Leaks Policy at Wednesday’s monthly meeting.
Under the old policy, complaints about excess water charges up to $250 were assessed by Council’s Rates team leader; amounts between $250 and $500 by the CEO; and amounts greater than $500 by Councillors.
Under the amended policy, however, all complaints will now be assessed solely by Council staff.
The change was flagged at last month’s Council meeting, when councillors dealt with several applications for reductions in water consumption charges for amounts up to $1950.
Under the Undetected Water Leaks Policy, the only time such requests can usually succeed is if the water leak occurs “out of sight” (ie below ground or inside walls) and a resident could not reasonably be expected to know that this had happened.
At last month’s meeting the Council heard a story about one ratepayer who’d apparently fallen victim to water thieves while away on vacation, and another about a landlord whose rental property’s toilet had begun to leak while a tenant was on holidays.
While both applications failed, Mayor Wayne Kratzmann said he felt there were times when the existing policy was producing outcomes that were “morally wrong”.
He thought the only way to introduce fairness into the appeal process was to put the onus on residents to check their water meters regularly.
If that occurred, he said, then the only avenue of appeal against excess water usage charges would be if a property’s water meter was found to be defective. And this would mean Council officers could deal with most requests for reductions in water usage charges themselves.
Libraries Introduce New Interlibrary Loan Fee
South Burnett residents who ask their local library to obtain a book from another library outside the region will now have to pay a $2.50 service fee for the privilege.
At this month’s SBRC meeting, Councillors heard the State Library of Queensland will no longer pay the freight costs for inter-library loans.
The State Library stopped paying freight costs on June 30 this year.
Acting General Manager Community and Cultural Services Carolyn Knudsen said the SBRC had handled requests for 2071 books last year at an estimated cost of between $6000 and $8000.
But the closure of the State Library’s program meant the SBRC had only two options if it wanted to maintain this “core service” – either try to absorb the full cost itself, or introduce an Interlibrary Loan service fee to attempt to recover part of the costs.
Cr Barry Green said he was opposed to the new service fee, saying he thought ratepayers already paid for “this kind of thing”. He added that while he was a believer in “user pays”, that didn’t apply in this case.
But Cr Cheryl Dalton said she had used the Interlibrary Loan Service herself and supported the new fee.
She said local libraries didn’t usually stock the highly specialised books that residents wanted to obtain from other libraries, and wouldn’t begrudge paying a small charge to obtain them.
“I’d much prefer to pay $2.50 to borrow a book than $70 to purchase it myself,” she said.
The motion to introduce the new service fee was passed six to one.
Desexing Deal Offers Big Savings
Residents who want to significantly cut their annual pet registration costs should take advantage of a new half-price desexing offer before the end of this year.
Council was told at this week’s meeting that the SBRC – in conjunction with the RSPCA, the Kingaroy Veterinary Surgery and Barambah Veterinary Surgery – will be offering half-price desexing and free microchipping of dogs and cats from October to December,
And pet owners who take up the offer could save as much as $115 a year on their yearly registration costs.
Cr Kathy Duff told Council that the cost of registering an entire, unmicrochipped dog was $142 per annum at present.
But this dropped to just $27 if the dog was desexed and microchipped.
Cr Duff pointed out that the Council would also refund the difference to residents who take up the new offer if it’s within six months of the animal’s last registration.
“This is something not a lot of people are aware of,” she said.
“It’s good news for pet owners.”
Cr Barry Green questioned why only two Kingaroy vets were involved in the program, saying that two vets from Nanango had contacted him about the matter.
Cr Duff said the initiative had come from the RSPCA and as far as she knew they’d contacted vets in the South Burnett, but only two had said yes.
The SBRC’s main role was to help promote the program to pet owners, she said.
