Incoming North Queensland mayors seek to balance industry with regional identity

New regional mayors believe a balance needs to be struck to maintain the identities of their communities with projected population growth.

Julia Creek is predominantly made of beef cattle farming but is likely to see much economic growth coming in brought about by vanadium mines, renewable energy, and large-scale construction project CopperString. Mayor Janene Fegan said the council needed to manage the boom.

New regional mayors believe a balance needs to be struck to maintain the identities of their communities with projected population growth.

Incoming McKinlay mayor Janene Fegan expects her shire’s hub, Julia Creek, 650km west of Townsville, to double from 500 residents within the next five years brought about by a mix of industries.

Beef cattle farming makes up more than 40 per cent of McKinlay residents’ incomes, according to 2021 census data, but Ms Fegan predicted growth from four potential mines, the development of CopperString, and the cotton industry.

Growth of renewables would also have an economic impact for the North Queensland rail corridor.

Ms Fegan was formerly the deputy mayor, but she will be sworn in this week in her new position along with a mix of incumbent and new councillors.

Incoming mayor Janene Fegan will be sworn into the role officially on Tuesday, having previously served as the deputy.

She wanted to be “managing the boom” that would come to Julia Creek and to sustain the small-town community feel, especially when the first vanadium mine is constructed, which is set to bring up to 200 jobs.

Another 1000 people are expected to be employed for the construction of CopperString, according to the project’s chief executive.

“We don’t want to become a mining town, we want to maintain that rural country feel we have, especially as agriculture is growing as much as the mining side of things,” Ms Fegan said.

Flinders Shire incoming mayor Kate Peddle won by two votes in the election, but was declared by the ECQ. Picture: Supplied.

Finding homes for the permanent workers could be a problem.

Ms Fegan said the council already had urged state and federal governments to address housing for the shire’s communities, which would be more costly to build because of the tyranny of distance which the North West faced.

She said the council would look at freeing up land for residential but also to enable a growth in the cotton industry.

It also would also aim to capitalise on the installation of the CopperString project by urging for the installation of a substation.

Flinders Shire mayor-elect Kate Peddle, declared by the Electoral Commission of Queensland despite an astonishing two vote lead against incumbent Jane McNamara, would be sworn in with her councillors on Tuesday.

Ms Peddle said she wanted to emphasise on “humility in our decision making” by listening to her councillors and to ratepayers, and so did not want to presume what council priorities would be.

But construction of projects such as CopperString “puts the pressure on us” to address housing and quality of services.

She said the council needed to “strike a balance for the quality of life”.

Business growth would put less pressure on the council to maintain the community, but at the same time there were many people that moved to Flinders Shire for the quiet lifestyle.

“I don’t think the country mentality would ever change and I’d hate to see it change,” Ms Peddle said.

But in the past 10 years Ms Peddle said she had noticed a loss of community identity brought about by decline of railway workers and even of small businesses such as pubs.

Originally published as Incoming North Queensland mayors seek to balance industry with regional identity