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ISSUE 240 SATURDAY, March 19 - March 25, 1988
LIVINGSTONE Shire residents will know their new chairman and councillors by 8pm today (Saturday), returning officer Jim Brown said this week. Mr Brown said it was anticipated divisions 2, 3 and 4 would be counted by 6pm and all counting would have finished by 8pm. Counting will take place in three sections at the shire office in Anzac Parade; division 1 votes will be counted in the Building Department, division 3 and 4 in the Finance Department and division 2 in the council chambers. Mr Brown said the chairman's count would be conducted at each section in conjunction with ``,e councillors' count. /oters will still be able to deliver their ballot
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papers to the shire office until 10am on Saturday. Any votes delivered after this time won't be valid. Presiding officers Denis Murphy, Kevin O'Brien and John Harmsworth will be posted at one-of-the-three voting locations. Six counting teams, with three people to a team, and six sorting teams of two people each, will also be involved during the day. Returning officer, assistant returning officer Kev Lloyd and the presiding officers, will be checking ballot papers and certificates for any informalities. If a ballot paper appears to be deliberately marked, or seem to be suspicious in any way, the officers will set them aside for the returning
Registered by Australia Post - Publication No OAC3843
officer to make a final decision. Counters and sorters, after opening the padlocked wooden ballot boxes, will sort the envelopes in alphabetical order. ) Continuing the alphabetical sequence, the envelopes will be opened and ballot papers removed. Two-man teams, assigned to different alphabetical sections, will be using the electoral roll to check off voters. Ballot papers are in two sections ... one for voting and the other is a certificate to be signed and witnessed. This certificate will be separated from the voting section after it has been checked to ensure ballot papers have been signed and witnessed.
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If there are no other noticable problems the certificate will be separated from the ballot paper section. The sealed ballot paper is placed in a locked box while the certificate is placed in another locked box. After ballot papers have been checked, and the sections appropriately placed, the ballot boxes are emptied, perforated edges are torn off and counting begins. Progressive counts will be posted during the day on a tally board outside each counting room. A tally sheet will also be available for reference. Only staff, candidates and scrutineers are allowed in the counting rooms.
Bowen: Heat, abuse
Turner: Confident
LIVINGSTONE Shire chairman Cr John Bowen said he would be monitoring the election's progress throughout today (Saturday) and following the counting procedure. "There is far too much heat and abuse during elections and I hope the new council works for the betterment of the community," he said. "I look at the Capricorn Coast and can't help but think what a beautiful place we have, and it's only the people living here that can make it a mess, or even more beautiful. "I hope that some of the political antics during elections don't damage the area's longterm potential." Cr Bowen said often the small, silly problems, were given huge headlines while the larger, more serious, problems were overlooked. "I hope the new council can rise above these problems and take a helicopter view of them," he said. "It would mean a lot of wasted energy is put to good use."
JIM TURNER said he was "quietly confident" of being the next Livingstone Shire chairman. "I was the only candidate who came up with early issues, and with hard work, and support from council and staff, many will be achieved," he said. "If I'm successful the whole community will knowwhat is happening and the truth about all projects on the drawing board. "I will not alarm the community with expectations such as the S50 million development planned at Joskeleigh." Mr Turner said he would be doing his utmost to encourage development at no cost to the ratepayer. "In my time in local government I have been involved with developments in excess of S2 billion," he said. "With this experience I should be the electors' ideal choice." Mr Turner said on Saturday he had a commitment in Emerald but would be back in Yeppoon late in the evening to see, and accept, the community's judgement.
Wildin: All the best
1
7 Days
LIVINGSTONE Shire Council chairman candidate Cr Barbara Wildin said she felt as confident and good about the elections as any candidate could before the actual counting. She intends spending today (Saturday) "dropping into the council chambers on and off to check the progressive count". When she takes a break from watching the count, her interests will be watched over by a team of scrutineers. "I think it's important to have scrutineers," Cr 'ildin said. When not watching the count, she did she would be at home with her family. "I wish all the candidates the best and I'm sure whoever is electedwill do their best to meet the community's needs in the next three years," she said.
Timbs: No backing
• ABOVE: Tegan Bubnan is one of those ladies who just can't stand a man gettingfresh ... even if the 'Ilan is her brother. Nathan and Tegan, both of Cawarral, are entrants in this year's Endeavour Foundation's Tiny Tots' Quest and they'll be spending a lot of time together. The reason for the Western gel-up is that both will be raisingfitnds at a Country and Western Cabaret at Cawairal Hall on Saturday, May 7.
CHAIRMAN candidate David Timbs said this week he had set out to run an honest campaign without backing from any groups. "I thought it was necessary to do that if we are to gain a genuine, harmonious community government," he said. "Mine has not been a loud extravagant millionaire's campaign and I've been careful with my own slender resources, just as I will be with those of the shire.
• CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
COUNCIL GOES QUIETLY AFTER ITS TUMULT AND DIVISION
• By John and Suzy Watson LIVINGSTONE Shire Council ended its term quietly on Wednesday ... taking its record of tumult and division to the people. The council that started with then Member for Callide Lindsay Hartwig as it chairman and closed with second-placed chairman candidate John Bowen as its appointed head, split the community by sacking shire engineer Tony Rowe, weathered the resulting storm of both praise and abuse, and escaped by a whisker from being sacked. Hartwig swept into power three years ago with a massive popular vote, taking about two-
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thirds of the votes with Bowen and Wall limping into second and third places. One year later, after endless meetings marked by a seven-six split (with Hartwig one of the six), he called it a day. His resignation caused further division when the resulting election of John Bowen was challenged in court. Rowe was sacked; a councillor (Jim Anderson) resigned; and the person appointed to his place caused further outcry because she wasn't next in line; she resigned shortly after being sworn in and was then replaced by next-in-line CrJohn Dowie. In addition, shire planner Raul
Weychardt resigned and a consultant was enaged. Almost every important decision caused division ... the council was openly divided and the community became either for, or against, a group of councillors. A petition was taken up to sack the council and then Local Government Minister Russ Hinze let it be known that the sacking was imminent ... then Deputy Premier Bill Gunn stepped in and saved the council's bacon. After that, the effort of fighting seemed to have taken its toll. The tumult quietened, the
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council met both in public and in private ... and forces on both sides licked their wounds waiting for today's election. As usual, the public campaigning was matched in ferocity and bitterness by private campaigning ... and now it's over. Today's count will seal the shire's future into the 1990s. Whoever gets elected, for whatever position, deserves the community's support. Yesterday must be forgotten if this area is to progress. It seems so pointless that life-long enemies are made over something so piddling as a local government election.
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