CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
Rockhampton residents are rushing to begin home renovations this week, after learning that you don’t really need a mayor or a council to run a medium sized semi-rural town in Central Queensland.
Rockvegas is now verging on close to a month with no one actually running the show.
This political binfire seems to have been lost on the locals, who have given up on engaging in this shit after the councils most spectacular scandal yet.
Former mayor Margaret Strelow resigned from her role, after a Councillor Conduct Tribunal ruled she engaged in misconduct – not even 6 months after the last local elections.
The ruling relates to a failure to update a register to include a hospitality benefit from Adani.
The Rockhampton Council revealed in 2017 that Ms Strelow received more than $1,600 in hospitality gifts from the mining giant during that trip.
The resignation briefly looked like the Central Queensland region could have a new mayor by default, after recent changes to the state’s Local Government Act.
However, the next cab off the rank was a local character by the name of Chris “Pineapple” Hooper – who nearly took the role in a Hollywood meets Bradbury comedy.
However, given the fact that Pineapple thinks the Adani mine is no good, the state government has rushed to change laws that would prevent him from taking the top job.
Instead, the locals are just settling for not having a mayor. Because they don’t miss having one, and they simply don’t care anymore.
In the meanwhile, all of the local services are now being managed by the Rocky Beef Week committee – who are proving to be much better operators when it comes to garbage collection and road maintenance.
MORE TO COME.
