Sunshine Coast Council mayoral candidate Min Swan answers the burning questions

Sunshine Coast mayoral candidate Min Swan has answered a grilling about her stance on Sunshine Coast transport and infrastructure, the environment and more.

We’ve put Sunshine Coast mayoral candidate Min Swan under the microscope ahead of the election. Here’s where she stands on the region’s biggest issues.

What comprehensive strategies do you propose to address transportation challenges on the Sunshine Coast, considering factors such as infrastructure development, public transit enhancement and sustainable mobility solutions?

Yeah, so transport and infrastructure is the largest issue on the Sunshine Coast at the moment and obviously it needs a multi-pronged approach to that because we are beholden to the federal and the state government for things like the passenger rail coming into Maroochydore city centre, which I am an advocate for. However with funding, budget, the announcement just recently that we’ll be getting to Caloundra by 2032, if the federal government contributes another 1.1 billion. So obviously, we can’t just sit and wait for that when we have a Sunshine Coast that needs connecting.

How do you plan to manage the population boom on the Sunshine Coast following the COVID-19 pandemic, with people moving here, putting pressure on services, and expected population growth?

So population, we’re told by the Queensland Government the projections over the next 20 years, so what we can’t do, I don’t believe is put our head in the sand. We actually need to make sure that if we want to preserve what we all hold so dear here on the Sunshine Coast, that we create a really balanced and planned approach to how our Sunshine Coast unfolds over the next 20 years. Of course, we’ve got the 2032 games, which is just a deadline motivator, but we’ve got in the next four years, the planning scheme review.

Min Swan running for Sunshine Coast Mayor. Picture – Madeline Grace.

The Sunshine Coast is widely known for its pristine coastline. How will you balance the competing interests of residents, tourists, surfers, swimmers in managing and protecting the coastline?

The coastline is why the majority of us moved to the Sunshine Coast. So preservation of that coastline and creating that balance. At the end of the day, if you chunk it up, everybody wants to enjoy where we are and the environment that we live in and so we have to actually continue to bring all of the right people to the tables to have communication and collaboration around what that protection looks like. We can’t just regard one section of the community for another section of the community.

How do you plan to balance the diverse needs of the hinterland and the coastal regions of the Sunshine Coast, ensuring resource allocation, infrastructure development, and economic opportunities?

I‘ve said all throughout my campaign that I will be a mayor for the whole region and I genuinely mean that so what that means is going back to the to my last response, I believe that the Sunshine Coast is a collection of the most incredible villages and communities all very unique. We need to be looking at all of our different communities as jewels in our crown and working out what each one of them needs.

Prominent businesswoman Min Swan is gunning for the role of Sunshine Coast mayor. Picture: Supplied

The Sunshine Coast has received world-class recognition for its environment with the Biosphere designation. How do you intend to navigate the tension between developing land to accommodate the booming population while preserving green spaces. What are your thoughts on developing on flood plains?

There are experts on both sides of those fence, then actually when you speak to them, which I have, they’re actually not that far apart in terms of wanting to make sure that the Sunshine Coast has a really great outcome. Some of the developers are looking for more certainty and clarity around what they’re allowed to do. So they’re looking for a planning scheme that gives them more understanding of where they can and cannot go and then of course, from an environmental perspective, we are not getting this region back if we just let it go.

Where do you stand on the Blue Heart Sunshine Coast project? Do you support it or do you think it needs review?

So the Blue Heart project is one that I’ve been aware of in terms of the delivery of that through the Sunshine Coast Regional Council. Until actually becoming a mayoral candidate, I wasn’t across the fact that there were actually people that were against the Blue Heart project. So this comes to another example of a of a project that needs looking at and a lot of extra questions asked so that we can get to an opinion.