The State Government are building 30 x one bedroom units at the corner of Brilliant Street and 19th Avenue, Mount Isa, which will be a gated community.  These units will be mostly for health staff, but also accommodation for teachers.  The development will back on to Captain Cook Park and a Mount Isa Family Day Care, it’s across the road from St Joseph’s Primary School and St Joseph's Kindergarten and After School Care, its one door down from Happy Valley Kindergarten and adjacent to that, Happy Valley Primary School and next door to Meals on Wheels.

There are future plans for a bike path on 23rd Avenue, that will go on St Joseph’s Primary School side and go past Captain Cook Park, this will remove around 20 carparks and as you know, parking is already an issue in this education prescient.

The block currently is empty but is used as an overflow parking by St Joseph’s families, heavily used as access for Meals on Wheels and used by various sporting groups for parking, which is a safer alternative, than parking on a busy 23rd or Fourth Avenues’.

New developments by the State Government are vital, but location and style is also extremely important.  We all want new accommodation for our teachers and hospital staff and better locations could be easily found throughout Mount Isa, to suit singles and families, which would be of little impact on current build timelines.

My thoughts?  Accommodation should not be built backing on to a park and while we can’t change the past, we can certainly make sure we don’t do this in the future.  Council did not build a basketball court at Gallipoli Park as neighbouring residents were concerned about noise.  Hospital workers are usually shift workers and they could be impacted by sports training, cricket game noise, lights and school recess bells, which happen several times a day.  The plan also shows that the residents will have a private access to Captain Cook Park, which could be dangerous, when children often hang around that park unaccompanied.  It will exasperate the current traffic and parking issues around the schools and could prove dangerous for children around school pick up and drop off times.

The State Government is our second biggest employer and they should be building a range of different styles of accommodation, one, two and three bedroom units as well as four bedroom houses around our city.  The fact that there are 30 one bedroom units being proposed in this location, means that no families can live in this complex and access this education prescient.

I would like to engage with the community on their thoughts about this proposed development.  I have discussed this issue with my six councillors, who are very supportive of the current proposal of 30 one bedroom units and the location and have declined to do community engagement on this issue.

But I would really like to hear what you think.

Community engagement is an important part of being a councillor and I’ve been voted in to be the voice of Mount Isa residents, please vote and if you have thoughts, I would love to hear them.