Who is Bundaberg mayoral candidate Kirt J Anthony?

THE Bundaberg South resident describes himself as “very caring, understanding, and willing to help you out.”

Kirt Anthony is a mayoral candidate for Bundaberg Regional Council. He attends Bundaberg CQUniversity for a mayoral debate. Picture: Chris Burns

MAYORAL candidate Kirt J Anthony has promised to paint local roadlines in yellow, protest against the Cashless Debit Card to Hinker MP Keith Pitt at every opportunity, and on social media uses “#madmandildo” as a campaign hashtag.

He is somewhat of a maverick among the three Bundaberg mayoral candidates, and was the first among the three to officially nominate.

Mr Anthony feels he brings a “barbarian” presence to the mayoral race against his more well-known; incumbent Mayor Jack Dempsey and incumbent Division 4 candidate Helen Blackburn.

Last Friday he appeared in the Bundaberg Magistrates Court, having faced charges of obstructing police and contravening a direction or requirement of police.

But the matter was adjourned and he had not yet entered a plea.

Kirt Anthony leaves the Bundaberg Court House last Friday. Picture: Mike Knott.

He describes himself as “very caring, understanding, and willing to help you out”.

“I do listen, I do understand if someone is having this type of problem,” he said.

He was born in the southern Perth suburb of Armadale 30 years ago, but he does not like to talk about his personal life.

“You’re going back years for me,” Mr Anthony said during an interview after the mayoral debate at CQUniversity last week.

“All I can remember now is I came here in 2014 to look at the economy, but you’re asking way too far back at this point.”

When he moved to Bundaberg he bought a property in South Bundaberg, with the plan to build a backpackers’ hostel.

In 2016 the building he constructed made partly of a shipping container was described as “an Esky on legs” in the Courier Mail.

-Kirt Anthony and his “Esky on stilts” in Bundaberg South.

Mr Anthony was trying to sell the property as he was under “a bit of financial strain” at the time, but currently resides there with his housemate, who attended the debate with him.

On social media Mr Anthony said he had worked as a security guard for local pubs, and as a government contractor, an entertainer, and a customer service officer.

And on his formal nomination form to the Electoral Commission of Queensland he identified himself as a work health and safety officer.

Mr Anthony said that he had actively complained and lobbied to the council to improve roads and flood mitigation, and he labels it an achievement for every road that has been repaired afterwards.

“I was bullied, teased, picked on since I came here and noticing the lower class infrastructure,” he said.

“I just went out there and I told everyone this place needed de-flooding, that place needed better roads, better infrastructures.”

Kirt Anthony supplied this photograph to the NewsMail when he formally announced he would be throwing his hat in the ring.

He was upset one night and compiled a list of priorities of what he felt Bundaberg needed.

“The family wouldn’t listen so I typed it up in the Canberra classifieds, everywhere, in all the classifieds, I told them what Bundaberg was, in 2015, and I’m still continuing on telling how Bundaberg was and how I found it,” Mr Anthony said.

As a mayoral candidate he has criticised the council spending $1.5 million to upgrade the top two floors of the Auswide building for offices, unsealed road verges, and the road design near the Bundaberg Airport, which he said from the air looked like a phallic object.

When discussing the subject on social media he tagged it as “#madmandildo”.

“You would be thinking, the mad man kangaroo or something?” he said, showing a printout of the aerial map.

“How do you feel about it?

“It’s art. You’ve got to say how you feel about it. What does it look like to you?”

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