Thank you to those who cleaned up our environment after the severe weather event recently and who were able to help on Clean Up Australia Day. Considering the event was on the verge of being completely cancelled, we had a good turnout at the Coolum Beach event organised by Ben at Raw Energy Coolum. It was staggering to see the volume of debris on our beaches from the floods. We picked up many pieces of styrofoam from damaged pontoons which looked like pumicestone, other bits of plastic that looked like cuttlefish bone and we even dragged a large piece of infrastructure pipe up from the beach. It was great that we could come together as a community to begin the flood clean-up that I’m sure will go on for some time.
Council crews have also been out picking up trees, branches and rubbish from recently impacted areas and beaches. They aim to clean up as quickly as tide and weather conditions allow, focusing on high use areas first. Some work may depend on the availability of machinery and any adverse weather, swell or tides. For your own safety, please avoid dangerous areas and follow any on-site signage. Please be kind to our staff and contractors out on site who are doing their best to repair damage and clean up the region.
The Coolum Skate Park was vandalised recently and had to be closed. Following community feedback, council has installed a solar-powered, temporary CCTV at Tickle Park. It will be in place for eight weeks. We hope this will deter any ideas of further damage to the park.
Finally, I would like to thank our community for following emergency warnings, checking on your neighbours and to the many volunteers, emergency workers and council staff who worked long shifts over many days and continued to support the Sunshine Coast during the recovery phase.