Top 30 most influential people in Gympie for 2022 revealed
Whether it be through politics, sports advocacy or social media, these people have had a strong hand in shaping the region this year. See final 10 in the list here.
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Gympie’s future is being shaped by its people, many of whom dedicate their time and energy to support the region and its community.
Following an almost year-long flood recovery, push for better sporting facilities and a federal election, many faces have become familiar as game-changers in Gympie.
30 under 30: Gympie’s most impressive young guns revealed
From sport advocates and social media gurus to business identities and politicians, these men and women are the most influential in the region.
Numbers 30 to 21 and numbers 20-11 of the 2022 Power 30 list have rolled out previously this week.
#10 Colleen Miller
Colleen Miller is a champion in the world of Gympie sports as president of the Gympie and District Netball Association.
A strong advocate for sports, Ms Miller has pushed for better sports facilities in Gympie since the netball courts were destroyed in the February 2022 flood disaster.
After the courts were left cracked and unplayable, and the clubhouse interior completely wiped out, Ms Miller has a plan to rebuild facilities.
Meanwhile, her club of 500 players is forced to play on the courts of Gympie State High School and Victory College.
Following about $500,000 in damages on the courts alone, Ms Miller secured $20,000 from the News Corp flood appeal and $100,000 from the Gambling Community Benefit Fund.
After receiving $289, 000 in state government funding (only about 5 per cent of $5m that was handed out across Queensland), Ms Miller spoke about the disappointment in the insufficient funds to repair the bare minimum of their facilities.
#9 Daniel Green
Daniel Green is well-known around town as a sports advocate for better facilities in Gympie.
The school PE teacher and treasurer of Gympie Athletics loves giving back to the community he grew up in.
“My goal is to help the community more and offer kids what I was offered,” Mr Green said.
He spent six months writing The History of Education in the Gympie Region 1867 – 2020 and revised his book again in 2022.
“When I finish with shot put in the next five or 10 years, I’d like to be able to help with growing Gympie a lot more whether that’s through certain positions or volunteer work or some other form of community work,” he said.
Mr Green was also a key player in the campaign in the Gympie Times Save Our Sport campaign earlier this year.
#8 Adrian Burns
Gympie Regional Council’s sustainability director slips into the top 10 of the 2022 Power 30.
Mr Burns, the only senior staff member not in an acting role at the council, joined the organisation in March 2021.
From February to May in 2022, he also served as the interim director of infrastructure.
Mr Burns has been at the helm of moving the region forward through its largest development boom in a decade, grapples with where the region’s waste will be taken in the future, and is preparing to implement a new planning scheme which will shape how the city looks in the next decade.
He has become a fixture at council meetings, helping clarify the council’s policies and positions for councillors, and how their decisions will affect the region.
He does this on the back of decades of experience in councils across Australia, including work with the Darebin and Melton councils in Victoria and the Fraser Coast Regional Council.
#7 Chris Callaghan
Gympie Magistrate Chris Callaghan first arrived on the local legal scene in 2019 but has been a magistrate for nearly 15 years.
Before he was appointed in 2007, Mr Callaghan worked as a solicitor on the Sunshine Coast in 1980, being admitted to the Bar in Brisbane in 1991 and working there until 1995.
From there, he worked primarily in the criminal courts until he became a magistrate in 2007.
Mr Callaghan’s role does not just extend to the Gympie courtroom; he also oversees the court as far north as Hervey Bay and Maryborough and as far west as Kingaroy, administering a system that handles 3500 matters a year, or about 70 cases a week.
He has said in the past his job consisted of only sending people to jail when it was absolutely necessary, because his biggest priority was keeping the community safe.
#6 Billy Mitchell
As the director of one of the Gympie region’s biggest real estate agencies, Billy Mitchell oversees one of the most influential businesses in the region.
Mr Mitchell is the owner and director of Century 21 Platinum Agents Gympie and Cooloola Coast, which has handled tens of millions of dollars of property sales.
His business interests extend beyond wheeling and dealing property though.
Mr Mitchell began his real estate career in 2011 as a salesperson and quickly climbed the ranks and transferred into business ownership in 2015.
He was voted among the best deal-makers in the country by Real Estate Business in 2019, which he credits to his love of customer service.
“I love being able to help people through their real estate journey,” Mr Mitchell said.
Century 21 Platinum Agents went home with the People’s Choice Award at the Gympie Chamber of Commerce Business Awards in 2022.
#5 Jody Allen
With a Facebook following of nearly 550,000, Jody Allen has cultivated a highly successful online presence and community from humble beginnings.
Since starting her smash-hit parenting blog ‘Stay at Home Mum’ from her spare bedroom in 2009, it has grown to the most popular blog in the country.
From money-saving hacks to parenting tips, Ms Allen has established herself as a guru, writing multiple best-selling books and making several television appearances.
In 2021, Ms Allen joined the fight to save the Gympie Hospital Children’s Ward after its closure due to lack of paediatric doctors.
#4 Shelley Strachan
Shelley Strachan is the managing editor for News Corp of the Wide Bay Burnett, overseeing and setting the news agenda in the Gympie region, the South Burnett, Central and North Burnett, Bundaberg and Fraser Coast.
She is a fierce advocate for the region, and in 2022 received the coveted News Corp Campaign of the Year local/regional for The Gympie Times campaign to Save Our Sport.
She has been instrumental in kick starting the careers of multiple young journalists, mentoring them in integrity, professionalism and strong local journalism.
Between them, The Gympie Times, The Fraser Coast Chronicle, Bundaberg Newsmail, South Burnett Times and Central and North Burnett Times are read by more than 100,000 people a week and have a combined Facebook following of more than 130,000.
A long-time Gympie local and mother of four, Ms Strachan is a well-decorated media veteran, taking home multiple PANPA Community News Brand of the Year awards, the News Corp Achievements in Regional Journalism award and most recently the Regional Local Campaign of the Year at the 2022 News Awards.
#3 Tony Perrett
Gympie MP Tony Perrett has been many things in politics, from a former councillor to a former deputy mayor, and his dedication to the region remains as he fulfils his role.
Mr Perrett was elected as the Gympie Member of parliament in 2015, a seat he has held for six years.
He was named Opposition spokesman for Agricultural Industry Development and Fisheries and Forestry in 2017, a job he has held since.
In this role, he advocated for flood affected primary producers, the timber and forestry industry, fisheries, and biosecurity and secured extra biosecurity staff and the extension of the disaster recovery grants.
Mr Perrett has been a strong advocate for services at the Gympie Hospital after the Children’s Ward and Fracture Clinic were temporarily closed due to staffing issues.
A Health Crisis Town Hall meeting was held following the Fracture Clinic’s closure, where more than 100 patients, families and health professionals discussed the growing issues in Gympie’s health sector.
Mr Perrett also supported and sponsored petitions about the systematic reduction in health services and ongoing issues with roads across the region.
Upon the Fracture Clinic resuming its operations, Mr Perrett labelled the clinic’s opening hours as “unsatisfactory” within a community the size of Gympie.
#2 Llew O’Brien
Federal member for Wide Bay has dropped from the top spot this year following the LNP’s loss in the federal election.
Mr O’Brien remains the region’s representative in Canberra and therefore a key leader of the community, albeit with his party in opposition against a Labor majority government.
He was re-elected this year after six years of representing Wide Bay in Australian parliament and living in the area for 35 years, with only a small part of the wider swing against the LNP being felt in his own two-party preferred numbers.
Mr O’Brien’s passion on behalf of the community has resulted in major wins for the region, including (and certainly not limited to) the fast-tracked construction of the $1b Gympie Bypass and securing an agreement to build a four-lane bypass at Tiaro in place of plans to build a divided two-lane stretch of road.
A former police officer, he supported the campaign for new district duty officers in the region and called senior officers an “important human resource.”
After $10m in possible funding for Gympie Regional Council, projects were scrapped by the federal government in October, Mr O’Brien blasted the decision, saying the slashing of the program showed “contempt” for councils and community groups.
#1 Glen Hartwig
Gympie mayor Glen Hartwig comes in number one in the region with his vision to make Gympie the preferred lifestyle destination for people in Australia.
Mr Hartwig said his goal for Gympie was to “make the region the place the people choose to live in, not have to live” in and preserving the country feel and warm, caring atmosphere without deterring growth and development.
He aims to work with the State Government to roll out “new and innovative” industrial growth that “works in harmony with nature.”
The Gympie Regional Council has been revising planning schemes, water allocation and asset management to as well as looking towards a future supporting business and tourism, he said.
Sports, as a major part of the Gympie region, will be a major focus for the council in the future, having “no investment in the sporting sector in the past.”
Mr Hartwig said Gympie needed an indoor stadium to house growing sports clubs, with the sporting sector one of the highest priorities in the next six years.
Since his election in 2020, Mr Hartwig has overseen a dedicated push to rebalance the council’s books and put an end to a string of operational losses which resulted in the Queensland Audit Office downgrading the organisation’s financial sustainability in 2020.
Before he was the region’s mayor, Glen Hartwig served as a councillor following a career with the Queensland Police.
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