August 17, 2017
Brooklands Rural Fire Brigade has been relieved of a $1290 plumbing fee because it acted quickly.
The brigade recently installed a toilet, shower and sink at their Lord Street shed.
At Wednesday’s South Burnett Regional Council meeting, Councillors heard the new facilities had been built to provide comfort to volunteer firefighters and incident controllers at the station.
The Council’s former long-standing policy was to give non-profit community groups a 100 per cent waiver on Council fees if they built new infrastructure.
But on July 1 a new policy to cut this rebate to 50 per cent was introduced in an effort to rein in costs.
Officers noted that while the Brooklands brigade hadn’t yet paid any plumbing fee, they had lodged their application for a waiver before July 1 and were entitled to have the full amount struck off under the Council’s former policy.
Councillors agreed.
* * *
Gordonbrook could have a new rural fire brigade shed soon after the South Burnett Regional Council said it will offer no objection to permanently closing a portion of two roads there.
At Wednesday’s monthly Council meeting, Council officers said they had received an application for a permanent road closure of the intersection of Memerambi Gordonbrook Road and Findowie Road.
The section that would be closed was about 2750sq m in size.
The reason for the closure was to develop and operate a rural fire brigade shed, which would be in a central position to serve Gordonbrook and its surrounding areas.
Council officers recommended the application be approved, and Councillors agreed.
The applicants will be told Council has no objection to the road closure providing the available land is used for Rural Fire Brigade purposes.
