The misallocation of public funds to benefit partisan interest, to the detriment of making such decisions based on merit, is nothing new in the state of NSW. However, the blatant justifications of the practice by the current coalition government are something new.

The Ballina Environment Society (BES) has accused Ballina Councillor Sharon Cadwallader of politicising water security by using ‘the Dunoon Dam as one of her key concerns in her bid for mayor in September’s local government elections’.

When I walk the streets of my town I feel this. I feel the divide. I watch the masked mingle with the ‘medically exempt’. There’s an unspoken agitation. A sense of ‘them’ and ‘us’. My town is no longer a place of love and acceptance. It is not a place of compassion and kindness. There is an undercurrent of distrust, suspicion and potential violence. We are being taken.

Plans are finally in for the redevelopment of the old Byron Hospital that will facilitate its transformation into a much-needed community hub.

A public health alert has been issued after a positive COVID-19 case travelled on the Virgin Australia flight VA1139 from Sydney, arriving in Ballina on 14 July at 11.45am.