Should we sentence the Neil Turner Weir to death?

I think it is time for some calm in the debate surrounding the future of the Neil Turner weir at Mitchell. Recent media reports have a number of locals and politicians calling for the Weir to be dismantled, but I urge people to consider the facts before acting as Judge, Jury and Executioner.

Many old timers advised of the flow patterns of the Maranoa river when in full flood, these patterns have not changed, What they said the river did in the 1950’s is just what it did this time, and the weir did not exist in the 1950’s.The river has not run at a height exceeding 9m since 1956 and it is only the third time since 1846 that it has been above the 9m mark.

The flooding of the town of Mitchell has more to do with the volume of water in the river, rather than the presence of the Neil Turner Weir, A quick history lesson will show that.

In 1846, Major Mitchell first explored the region and found the Maranoa River, 15 years later, in 1861 Mitchell Downs station was founded. In 1864, a flood of 9.56m washed the homestead away and the owners moved to the present location of the Mitchell Downs homestead. The ruins where taken over by Mr Thomas Close and the Maranoa hotel was opened.  The town of Mitchell grew up around these establishments and grew to become the community it is today. For 148 years the town of Mitchell has existed happily on the banks of the river. On Friday, February 3rd, the Maranoa River rose to reach a peak of 9.84m, 0.28m above the previous record peak. There is not a road, building or person in Mitchell who was around to experience a flood of anywhere near this magnitude, a record that has stood for 148 years was washed away.

I would call for the operators of the Weir to undertake a review of the weir and pending that outcome, to make a decision on its future. I personally would like to see the weir desilted, rather than removed.

I would suggest that the lack of culverts under the railway line had a bigger impact on the extent of the flooding in Mitchell, rather than the Weir, Large culverts and bridges under the railway line through the town area where removed years ago and replaced by one small culvert. What the railway has done is build a levee to hold the water back onto the northern side of town.

The people of Mitchell deserve some answers and I think a detailed review of all structures on the floodplain is required, but let’s not condemn any community asset to the history books without a proper review.

The Maranoa Region

The recent floods have highlighted an interesting fact to me. It is something that I have known and suspected for some time, that is, that the footprint of the amalgamated council is disenfranchising people in smaller outlying communities.

 If you ask anyone to identify the communities within the Maranoa, most people would be able to bang off a list that contained Roma, Mitchell, Injune, Surat, Yuleba, Wallumbilla, Amby and Mungallala. But there are many more, communities such as Dunkeld, Begonia, Noonga, Bymount and some located just over our border such as the Nebine. While these communities may not have shops and post offices, they do have schools or halls or community facilities.

Such centres often form social hubs where people can go to interact with their friends, or hold their community group meetings. These centres are often used by visiting organisations such as Landcare or Agforce to hold training days. Many of them are currently being used for community recovery centres by the government after the recent floods.

Often the residents who are serviced by these communities can be forgotten in the mix when decisions are being made within the shire. The problem is exacerbated when these communities receive their mail service from towns located outside the shire.

 Let’s take, for example the community of Begonia.

 Begonia is located on the Mitchell-St George road. Its nearest town is St George from where a large number of the community receive their mail service and where a lot of people from the area go to do their shopping. I would venture to guess that the local paper of choice would be the Balonne Beacon and the radio station most often listened to would be 711AM ABC southern Queensland. Begonia has a station homestead, a school and a community hall/sports club.

 Given that their mail comes from St, George, they would receive all of the community mail from the St. George area. They would most likely even receive the Balonne shire council community information.

 So what, you say, why are you telling me all about a community Located near St. George?

 Because these people are Ratepayers in the Maranoa Shire. Their nearest council office is Roma, Surat or Mitchell, yet they are serviced by St. George. It’s worth considering this, if the council sends out a householder to the post offices in the shire, People at Begonia don’t get it. It was a long while before they even received the Bottle tree bulletin. Then it is only by direct mail.

We have all heard about how the floods have affected Roma and Mitchell. But these floods continued down the Maranoa through communities such as Dunkeld and on to Begonia. There where houses down there inundated with water, just like everywhere else. There where roads washed away down there, Just Like everywhere else and there where people isolated in their homes by floodwater, Just like everywhere else.

While the army and the SES and any number of other volunteers turned up to help us clean our houses and towns, the people of Begonia have largely been left to their own devices. Landcare and QMDC have made contact with a number of people down there to see if they are OK and have had teams of volunteers there to help them clean up. But they are still fighting a massive battle.

 They are wanting for the simplest of things, a dry pit to tip their flood damaged goods into and basic repairs to roads so they can get to town. But no-one seems to have heard their cry.

 These kinds of issues are not unique to Begonia. We have ratepayers serviced by towns outside the shire such as Morven and Bollon where the same sorts of issues arise. I suppose they are luckier than the people of the Birdsville district though. Their shire office is in Boulia. To send a postal ballot from Boulia to Birdsville it goes Boulia, Mt. Isa, Brisbane, Adelaide, Marree, Birdsville then to the property, where the box is ticked and posed back to Birdsville, Marree, Adelaide, Brisbane, Mount Isa, Boulia.  Halfway round the country and back to go a couple of hundred miles. I’ve been told this can take several weeks.

It pays to remember when we complain that we don’t know what is going on in our patch, that there are some who probably won’t even know the issue has arisen when we have already found the answer.

Let’s all help where we can!

I, like many other people have been helping out the flood victims where I can. Mucking out houses and delivering cleaning products to businesses to help kick start their cleanup has taken some of my time recently, but there is another part of helping flood victims that is a little less obvious.

A healthy and balanced community is a finely tuned thing. The simplest of things can start a chain reaction with dire consequences. We are all well aware of the many possessions that have been lost from over 300 homes in Mitchell alone and we have all heard the stories of people donating goods to the victims to help them recover what they have lost. While this is a good thing in the short term to supply items such as emergency clothing, cleaning products and foodstuffs, when it comes to refurnishing their homes, this may not necessarily be in the best interest of the community in the long term.

The businesses in our town supply the products, services, jobs and commerce that makes our town a town. These businesses are the same ones that sponsor things such as the footy team, the races, the campdraft and the show as well as many other events and activities. When donated goods come into the town from outside, this can mean that these businesses have missed out. In rewarding one part of the community, we have disadvantaged another.

Take, for example, a can of baked beans. If someone from away was to purchase a can of baked beans and donate it to someone in Mitchell, the benefits are simple, the business from away gets the money and someone from Mitchell gets the baked beans. If the person wishing to donate the beans was to buy them in Mitchell, that would provide the grocery store with a sale AND the tin of baked beans to the person who needs it.

If we where to source our donated goods here in town, we would see money going back into the local businesses who, in turn pay wages to residents in the town, by fuel for their car, employs the services of a local tradesman and so on.

Studies have shown that for every dollar brought into a community from outside is equal to $3 going around within that community. Couple to that the money spent on freighting the goods to town, and the cost increases further.

What I suppose I am saying is that while we should always be willing to donate goods to those in need, if we really want to see bang for our buck, then we would be better off donating the cash.

“Ahh” you say, “But how do I know that my money will get used to help those in need and not gobbled up in admin fees or wasted on grog and cigarettes?” the answer is in how the money is distributed.

Maranoa and Regional Support Services, Mitchell and District Landcare and the Booringa Action Group have set up the “Mitchell Community Flood Appeal” this fund will be administered by the 3 organisations and 100% of the funds raised will be distributed to the community. It is proposed to issue vouchers redeemable at local businesses and the businesses have agreed not to supply cigarettes or alcohol. Voucher holders will be able to use them in the business of their choice.

To donate to the Mitchell Community Flood Appeal, you can deposit at any branch of the NAB:
BSB: 084822
A/C: 128598929
Use your full name as the reference and email details for tax deductible receipt to... 'recovermitchell@gmail.com' or phone Sharyn at BAG on 46237814.

We should also consider, that if we are coming from outside the Mitchell community to help, we would be doing the whole community a favor if we where to buy the goods we needed here.

Flood monitoring station at Forestvale must be reinstated

Today I sent a media release to the local paper calling for the return of the automated river height recording station at Forestvale 60km North of Mitchell. Re-Automation of the river height station at Forestvale must be a priority of any incoming council.

The automated station at Forestvale was installed by the then Irrigation and Water Supply to monitor river flows to help calculate the volume of water through the river for use when designing irrigation schemes downstream. There was an extensive network of automatic monitoring sites in a number of the creeks and streams in the area. In the immediate area around Forestvale, there where three automated stations being Maranoa River at Mulkitty, Maranoa River at Forestvale and Merrivale River at Munnaweena plus a manual station at Forestvale as well. Now there are none, they have all been decommissioned or abandoned.

After the decommissioning of the Forest vale automated recording site, river height observations where conducted manually by the manager of Forestvale up until the time that the property was sold around 15 years ago. The new owner does not have a permanent manager in attendance, but a number of temporary employees who come and go as required, therefore, the local knowledge of river conditions is at risk of being lost, and the recordings are not done.

Predicting the recent record flood in Mitchell was made even more difficult by the lack of advance warning from upstream. The only recording station upstream of Mitchell is a manual station at Currawong, about 3 hours of river time upstream from Mitchell. The property owner at Currawong and his family did a mighty job in keeping everyone informed of the river conditions upstream from the town, but above them, there was nothing.

There has been talk of doing something at Forestvale for a long while, but it seems to have fallen through the cracks of the three tiers of government. Council must take a leadership role here and get this problem fixed now.