The town of Cardwell Far North Queensland needs your support to become its own Shire once again. We are a small town on the coast of Queensland getting royaly shafted by the nepotism of the Cassowary Coast Council and have been for a prolonged period.

Since the amalgamation of the Johnstone Shires on 15th of March 2008 Cardwell has been left in the dark and gone backwards. With well over $50 million dollars in rates and not alot to show for it, we think the town is ready to take back the reins and support each other as a local community. 

The locals of Cardwell know it's not the priorty and hasn't been for quite some time. We don't need to list everything the council has done wrong by us as we only have 716 charters left on this petition. However, here is just a few examples to give you an insight to some of the major headaches the community is dealing with.

 •Hinchinbrook Marina nightmare•Unsealed roads being downgraded to dirt tracks •Esplanades downgraded to footpaths •Local buisness having more hinderance then help to get up and running •No real tourism support or even signage for swimming holes or local attractions •Basic curb and gutter drainage for the houses not even on the radar •Toilets at the football grounds/kids playground are on their way to being closed in order to save money •Dredging of the marina being ignored for emergency services, local fisherman/sailors and tourism operators •The list goes on and you can look at the buget snapshots over the last decade and it becomes quite obvious the master plan is aimed elsewhere.

Cyclone Yasi caused much destruction and heartache however enabled Cardwell to get a well overdue foreshore facelift, however we should not have to rely on natural disasters nor the state government bail outs when we can selfmanage in location. 

The locals feel that penny pinching with a money hungry attitude is not going to get anyone ahead promptly or efficiently. In more recent news the Cassowary Coast is now trying to "close the toilets at the kids playground near the football oval" claiming its too expensive". How un-Australian can we get here.....since when was toilet paper blowing the budget..... it is quite obvious the communities prosperity is being distributed elsewhere unproportionally and has been for over 13 years.

Already the transit centre is relying on privately owned toilet facilities, and no central toilet amenities are really available or "visible" to the main road and the council has passed the responsibilities back onto the local owners. Whilst millions of dollars was handed out just 2 years ago around towns closer to the council hub, Cardwell was to be allocated $150k for transit centre upgrade and $270 for Balloli st upgrade. Nothing even happened that we can see, no works carried out at all ???? Were just subsidising the development of other towns and keep getting ignored and treated like crap!! 

This year's budget snapshots 2021-2022

Innisfail $5.265 million -  Mission Beach $4.582million - Tully $4.825million - Cardwell $100k  Whilst Cardwell Kennedy Currachan Bilyana and other surrounding rural areas get slammed with rates averaging $1500 for 6 months, Kennedy must be one of the only localities in Australia without a park for the kids! Nothing for years :( poor old Kennedy..... 

With too many people in the office and not enough boots on the ground an overhaul is needed, this does not need to be complex just going back to what works. 

The simple solution                                                  Poor communication between people, functions, and departments that slows things down. The simple solution is to allow the free flow of information to travel in any direction, between all levels, regardless of your status or position. If something needs to get communicated in a way that will increase efficiency and productivity, it has to travel the shortest distance.

If in order to get something done between departments, an individual contributor has to talk to their manager, who talks to a director, who talks to a VP, who then talks to another VP, who then talks to a director, who then talks to a manager, who then talks to someone doing the actual work, then super dumb things will happen. It must be OK for people to talk directly and just make the right thing happen.

A local council can make this possible and help information flow freely  amongst the community and not be filtered or redirected. We dont want your money or our money back we want our independence to think for ourselves.

Every body is so busy and we have so much on our plates however,

A quick signature and forwarding this petition will go a long way in regards to a legitimate case for Cardwell to become its own Shire once again. Bring back the flame tree 

We sincerely thank you for your genuine support 

Love from Cardwell folk