Though still in Ballarat caring for my mother, I do keep an eye on Tweed Council, and wanted to share a few thoughts for this election.
The extensive list of Mayor Cherry’s activities reported to Council every month has been very impressive. She is incredibly thoughtful and unquestionably fair to all sides of politics.
I couldn’t have asked for a more diligent, hard-working community defender than Cr Nola Firth to take my place. She thoroughly researched every issue, always stood up for the community, and made so many improvements in Council it’s impossible to list them all.
Deputy Mayor Meredith Dennis always puts residents first and her work in the community is truly inspiring.
Cr Owen’s disappointment over not being elected as mayor by his fellow councillors caused division and, in my opinion, got in the way of more positive work that could’ve been achieved by Council. His claim for deserving the mayoralty, due to his high vote at the last Council election, doesn’t hold water when considering he never voted for me to be the mayor, though I had the highest vote for three elections straight!
It was disappointing when Cr Brimsmead joined Cr Owen in a walk-out protest over Cr Owen again not winning councillor support at the last mayoral election.
And it was always hard to predict which way Cr Byrnes would vote but especially so after he lost the deputy mayoral vote. Sadly his ‘extreme greens’ campaign pitch is just a copy from the dirty politics of the ‘90s that labelled Labor, and even esteemed former mayor Max Boyd, as ‘extreme green’.
I did detect a slight mellowing in Cr Polglase and was impressed by his vote for Cr Cherry as mayor. I wish him well in his retirement.
One of the most shocking things of this Council term was when Crs Owen, Brimsmead, Byrnes and Polglase voted not to defend the developer’s court appeal over his proposed change of fill material at the Turnock Street development. Trucking in soil from Queensland, instead of using the approved sand method, caused major concerns of even further worsening flooding, and horror at the prospect of 68 trucks per hour past the hospital (34 trucks in and 34 trucks out). Thankfully, with extreme pressure from the community and a looming election, the majority vote changed back for the community.
Please vote strategically for candidates you can always rely on to put the community and safety first. The Greens had the lowest vote last election so actually need your support the most, if you love the Tweed and still want to ‘keep it green’. Best of luck!
♦ Katie Milne is the former Tweed mayor.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
