Central Coast’s biggest 20 news stories of 2020
Twenty-twenty has been a year like no other and while the threat of COVID-19 still lingers, we take a look at 20 of the biggest stories that have shaped, shocked or captivated the Central Coast.
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COVID-19
On January 1 this year no one could have predicted the global fall out from what was at the time a relatively unheard of health crisis gripping one of China’s least known major cities.
Australia recorded its first case on January 25 and by March 20 social distancing and lockdown laws started coming into effect, as shopping centres put limits on certain items following a wave of panic buying.
A woman in her 30s was the first confirmed case of coronavirus on the coast on March 22 and an 80-year-old woman, with a pre-existing condition, was the first and only confirmed death on April 22.
To date there have been 118 local cases and (touch wood) no current cases.
COUNCIL COLLAPSE
Central Coast councillors emerged from a crisis meeting on October 6 to announce what appeared to be a $89 million budget deficit.
The announcement followed months of murmurs and political in fighting about council’s real financial position.
When it became apparent council could not even afford to pay its own staff Local Government Minister Shelley Hancock suspended councillors and appointed Administrator Dick Persson.
Mr Persson’s first report showed things were a lot worse and now residents are staring down a 15 per cent rate rise, up to 300 council jobs are on the chopping block and a heap of capital works are under threat not to mention a looming fire sale of council land.
YEAR OF THE GUN
On March 17 alleged gunman Bradley White, 40, allegedly shot dead Byron Tonks, 20, and wounded another person before barricading himself in a house on Cutler Drive at Wyong.
He was eventually arrested after an hour-long stand-off and charged with murder. He remains before the courts.
It was one of three dramatic, brazen shootings on the coast this year.
On October 15 Josh Duke, 37, was shot dead by police following a pursuit at Hamlyn Terrace. A week later Daniel Bolton, 30, shot himself in the neck at the same time as an officer discharged their weapon.
Bolton’s parole had been revoked and when police noticed him in a black Mitsubishi a pursuit ensued before they caught up to him running shirtless through The Entrance with two firearms.
COASTAL EROSION
A low pressure system pummelled the Central Coast for days in the second week of July before a combination of big seas, high tides and torrential rain caused massive erosion at Wamberal and North Entrance beaches on July 16.
Overnight beachfront properties at Wamberal had backyards, decks and stairs washed away leaving dozens of properties on the brink of collapse and residents forced to evacuate.
Emergency works began three days later with thousands of tonnes of rock and rock-filled bags craned in to prevent further collapse.
It was a similar scene, albeit on a slightly smaller scale, at North Entrance.
Local Government Minister Shelley Hancock announced a task-force to design a sea wall to protect affected properties and hundreds of millions of dollars of infrastructure on the other side of the dune, once and for all.
NIGHTCLUB SCANDAL
Prominent nightclub owner Ross Glynatsis had a spectacular fall from grace when he was sentenced in August over a tale as old as time.
The court heard the 65-year-old hired some bikie muscle to sort out a business dispute over a $40,000 debt when he purchased the cafe under his Sirens nightclub at Terrigal.
However once the debt went away the Bandidos bikie started demanding regular payments.
Glynatsis went to the cops and “wore a wire” to help convict the bikie of extortion.
But when the bikie got out of jail, Glynatsis said he started receiving threats so he had someone drop off a pistol to his Erina unit.
When Strike Force Raptor officers raided his unit they found the gun, ammunition, a taser like device, flick knife and an extendible baton.
They also found cannabis and almost 34g of cocaine.
Glynatsis was convicted, fined almost $3,200 and sentenced to a 10-month intensive corrections order along with 250 hours of community service.
DRUG SYNDICATE DISMANTLED
Fifteen people were charged when police allegedly dismantled a “significant” drug network on the Central Coast stretching from Gorokan to Terrigal.
In February 2020 the Tuggerah Lakes Proactive Crime Team established Strike Force Harle to investigate the distribution of illicit drugs and in particular methylamphetamine.
Police conducted a series of eight simultaneous dawn raids on properties on Friday, July 31, with 15 people — eight men and seven women — arrested and charged with more than 250 offences.
Police allegedly seized drugs including methylamphetamine, GHB, cocaine, MDMA and cannabis with an estimated street value of nearly $250,000.
Police also lallegedly ocated more than $210,000 cash.
The men and women remain before the courts.
CONTROVERSIAL RAIL YARD
Two years after it was the scene of protests by angry residents fearful their quiet rural lifestyle would be ruined, major construction at the $265 million Kangy Angy rail maintenance facility finished in August.
The rail yard, with its 6km of electric train lines and 140 CCTV cameras, also boasts possibly the most expensive driveway in the country in the form of a $50 million overpass road into the facility.
Meanwhile the first of the $2 billion fleet of 55, 10-car trains, which will service the Central Coast, Newcastle, south coast and Blue Mountains have been undergoing testing.
NEW SCHOOL
Construction began in May on the new $39.5 million primary school at Warnervale, which was named Porters Creek Public School.
Porters Creek Public School will provide 20 new permanent airconditioned classrooms for about 500 students, as well as a library, hall, canteen, administration facilities, a drop-off and pick-up zone and an Out of School Hours Care (OSHC) service.
Depending on weather and other factors the school should be complete by late next year with the first enrolment of students in Term 1 of 2022.
HITTING CRICKET’S GLASS CEILING FOR SIX
Not many people get to make history in their sport but that’s exactly what Tiegan Kavanagh has done with a dream debut, despite hating the game when she first tried it.
The 23-year-old not only made her debut for the Wyong club in the Central Coast first grade cricket 50 overs competition in November — the first woman to do so — she also took four wickets and was named Man of the Match.
The medium pace bowler also plays for the Sydney Cricket Club in the NSW Women’s Premier Competition each Sunday and was also a member of their premiership winning side last season.
COLD CASE MURDER SOLVED
The body of Ronald Penn may never be found but at least his killer is known 25 years after 61-year-old disappeared without a trace.
Graham Thomas Sales pleaded guilty to Mr Penn’s murder in the Supreme Court in May, ending a case that has frustrated police for two and a half decades.
Police had long suspected Sales was behind the killing but without a body, evidence was hard to come by.
Sales admitted to killing Mr Penn at The Entrance and soliciting his brother to gun down a woman, known as JF, outside Wyong Local Court in October 1995.
JF, who was attending court to take out an AVO against Graham Sales, survived after being blasted with a shotgun.
Sales, 56, pleaded guilty to murder and solicit to murder and was sentenced to a non-parole period of eight years and six months jail. He was already serving a 31-year prison sentence for torturing and raping women in the 1980s and 90s.
FREE TO TAKE OFF
After having its wings clipped by the now suspended Central Coast Council, which shelved a master plan, refused to do basic safety maintenance and moved to call it Warnervale Aircraft Landing Area, the airport is back in business.
Ending years of uncertainty around flight caps, the State Government resolved to repeal the Warnervale Airport Restrictions Act while Administrator Dick Persson approved the trimming of trees at the end of the runway.
Next year the airport plans to host a major air show and demonstrate once and for all what a vital asset it is to the region.
SCAFFOLDING COLLAPSE
In what was arguably the year’s closest escapes, just one woman suffered a head injury when tonnes of scaffolding collapsed in Gosford’s Mann St.
Emergency crews were called at 3.20pm on August 19 after the scaffolding came crashing down on eight cars.
A woman in her 40s was walking past and was struck but miraculously no one was killed at what was typically a busy time in the CBD’s main street.
Construction workers were removing the scaffolding at the time when a huge gust of wind hit.
The site of the old Union Hotel was being demolished to make way for the multi-tower $400 million Archibald development.
FORMER MAYOR CHARGED
Former Gosford mayor Laurie Maher was charged in April with sexually abusing boys during his time as a superintendent at Mt Penang Training School between May 1977 and December 1988.
Laurence Joseph Maher, 82, pleaded not guilty to 13 offences at Penrith Local Court and will defend the allegations.
Mr Maher was one of nine people charged by officers from Strike Force Eckersley, which was established in 2016 following a series of complaints made to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
HE’S TOUGH, NO BONES ABOUT IT
We’ve heard stories of rugby league gladiators playing with broken jaws and cheekbones but this year we had one about a young footballer playing a game with four broken bones.
Lachlan Shelley, 20, of Terrigal, only discovered he had played through the pain of two broken bones in his left hand in four games of Shute Shield for Eastwood when he played another round with fractures in both wrists. Ouch!
He’s undergone surgery and will be hopefully fully fit after a solid pre-season.
JUSTICE FOR JAYDEN
Jayden Mason was remembered in April as a “gorgeous larrikin” with a “heart of gold” after two men were sentenced over the 21-year-old’s manslaughter.
Ryan Vincent Paterson, 37, of Erina, was sentenced to a non-parole period of 12 years and five months while Benjamin Keith O’Brien, 31, of Norah Head, was sentenced to a minimum term of five years and six months jail.
The pair chased Mr Mason up Lake Haven Drive after a brief verbal altercation outside Wyong Leagues Club in 2017.
O’Brien punched him in the head while Paterson jumped on his head with both feet in a senseless attack which shocked the coast.
FIELD OF DREAMS
The long awaited $10 million redevelopment of Leagues Club Field is nearing completion.
The plan to turn the once vast expanse of grass by the waterfront into a vibrant regional playground complete with tidal play pool was announced in 2018 with the majority of the works taking place this year behind construction fencing.
The State Government-led upgrade was among a number of announcements at the time to revitalise Gosford’s CBD.
GOING TO NEED A BIGGER STRAP
Five 40-foot shipping containers washed up on Birdie Beach near Norah Head after container ship lost part of its load in rough seas on May 24.
Another five containers were spotted off Terrigal. It followed thousands of face masks and broken up pieces of styrofoam which surfaced along the coast from Norah Head down to Forresters Beach.
Singapore-flagged ship APL lost 40 containers overboard after it was struck by heavy seas 73km south east of Sydney.
ADCOCK PARK REDEVELOPMENT
West Gosford’s Adcock Park had looked the same for decades — until this year.
Stage one of the highly anticipated $26.2m redevelopment was officially opened in December with a new amenity building/clubhouse available to seven sporting codes.
As the ribbon was being cut on the new clubhouse, the tired old Gosford Netball Association building in the background was being demolished.
The project, funded by council and the State Government, was split into stages to minimise disruption to local sports.
Stage two includes reconstruction of the playing fields, five new netball courts, floodlighting, drainage and irrigation upgrades as well as a carpark at the entrance and pedestrian footpaths.
AFL DREAMS COME TRUE
Eight years after picking up a Sherrin at Adelaide St Oval Marc Sheather realised his AFL dream this year by being drafted on the Swans rookie list. The 18-year-old tall utility played his formative footy as a junior at Killarney Vale Bombers and is poised to follow in the footsteps of fellow Bombers junior Daniel Lloyd, who has been resigned with GWS Giants.
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