Mayoral Minute - December 2024

Published on 08 January 2025

Being the last meeting for 2024, I’d like to take the opportunity to thank the councillors and staff for the fantastic work they’ve done this year.

Mount Isa City Council as an organisation has a new look and feel this year and we have achieved some significant milestones – we’ve done the Parks Replacement Program, completion of the MRF (Materials Recovery Facility), the recycling education program (as of December 13, the recyclable waste collected has very little contamination, due to the hard work of our staff), completion of the Mount Isa Economic Transformation and Diversification Strategy, and the upgrade of Ellen Finlay Park in Camooweal.

Our acting CEO became our permanent CEO, adding continuity to the team that has not been present for some time.

We have two new councillors on the Audit and Risk Committee – Councillor Dan Ballard and Councillor James Coghlan – adding oversight to policies, procedures and business units, to find value for ratepayers.

We have three new councillors on the MICCOE board – Councillor Travis Crowther, Councillor John Tully, and myself – working with management to rectify maintenance issues, increase sales, and look at cost reduction.

The Civic Centre has once again been embraced by the community as somewhere to come for community events, such as awards nights, formals, and other civic activities. The staff there have put on entertainment that the community have loved, such as the Bluey Show and the Bubble Spectacular.

Both the Civic Centre and the library celebrated their 50th birthday in 2024.

As a community, we’ve taken part in the six celebrations held by Mount Isa Mines to celebrate their 100 years. Thanks to their team for providing these celebrations.

It has indeed been a busy year, and one of my first jobs as mayor was to do the speech on the Family Fun Night.

One of the highlights of the year was giving the speech at the 100-year Casa Grande Ball.

In terms of our economic recovery, as a Council we have signed three Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) that will bring new transformative projects to our town in the future – with Green Gravity, Flying Whales, and Cobalt Blue.

While 2025 will be another year of extreme uncertainty economically, and we will have yet another election – the federal one – there is much to look forward to.

The only thing we can be certain of is change, and how we adapt and react will be the predictor of success. Preparation is key, and we at Mount Isa City Council feel prepared for the upcoming challenges and look forward to sharing our future-ready economic roadmap being launched on February 21.

Many of you would have heard in the media recently that the State Government have committed to giving Mount Isa City Council $2 million to our economic recovery, and to be used to ensure the continuity of the Mount Isa Rodeo.

We have listened to the community and have undertaken not to use ratepayers’ funds for this purpose, but we were very pleased when the government stepped in to offer support and to grant Mount Isa City Council funds to help pay suppliers.

Moving forward, Council intends to have a seat on the new rodeo board made up of community members, with our representative being Councillor John Tully.

I hope everyone that is traveling over the break drives carefully and everyone has some down time to spend with friends and family. I look forward to seeing you all back and refreshed in 2025.