Friday, 3 March, 2023
Selling more than the next 4 agencies combined $600M
Clinton’s super swim
Memories of Grand Slams past
Riding for breast cancer
32-page liftout Property Guide
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INSIDE
AGENCY 4 & 5
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AGENCY 2 & 3
$300M
PR OP ER TY
The Doonan set to open By Abbey Cannan It was all hands on deck during Noosa Today’s visit to The Doonan last Friday as their team prepared for the upcoming opening date this week. Queensland family-owned company, the Comiskey Group has partnered with long-time friends and hospitality veterans, Josh Jones and Neville Allen to bring a unique venue to the Noosa region. The Doonan has been brought to life with the extensive renovation of the land’s existing structure, originally built in 1990 and operated as a German restaurant. The Comiskey Group director Rob Comiskey said they were excited to finally be opening the venue after acquiring the two-hectare site at 6 Beddington Rd back in 2006. “It’s been a long and hard battle but when you see it today, it’s just amazing,” Rob said. “I don’t think they’re expecting this, when people walk in. It’s more of a nursery than a hotel or pub. From the menu to the gardens, it’s a really cool concept and you’ll have to come and see it.” Continued page 4 and 5
The Doonan owners - Rob Comiskey, Paul Comiskey, Josh Jones, David Comiskey and Neville Allen.
United in victory As we near the 10th anniversary of Noosa’s deamalgamation from Sunshine Coast Council, PHIL JARRATT reflects on our six-year battle for independence “It might just be the strangest war cabinet in the history of conflict. One whose generals wear Michelin hats, and the lieutenants a uniform of fetching cream linen. And when the foot soldiers join the chow line at base camp in this little skirmish, forget bully beef and powdered eggs — they can expect tuna tartare and wagyu carpaccio in their tin pannikins.”
Matthew Condon, Courier-Mail Weekend, 19–20 January 2008 Just after dawn on 18 April 2007, a typically balmy, mid-autumn Noosa morning, former business titan Bob Ansett slipped into his running gear and, following the daily routine he’d established more than a decade earlier when he and wife Josie retired to their beach house, switched on the kitchen radio and made coffee while he carefully stretched his calves and thighs. The volume was low for Josie’s sake, but Ansett suddenly did a double-take when he
realised the ABC announcer was talking about a local government reform commission for Queensland. He flicked the dial up a notch and gave the broadcast his fullest attention while he sipped his coffee. By the time he left the house for his seven-kilometre run through the Noosa National Park to Main Beach, he was very, very angry. On the previous afternoon Queensland’s Labor government had announced a local government reform commission to investigate widespread amalgamations of regional councils, with Noosa high on its hit list. The idea of a Sunshine Coast “super coun-
BEST PRICE GOLD BUYERS At Noosa Civic (Outside Woolworths) March 6th - 12th Richard Macdonald and his team bring with them an exquisite collection of jewellery and an insatiable appetite for your unwanted pieces. Inquiries 0411 413 393 12589180-MS09-23
cil” had been mooted for decades, usually whenever Noosa Shire Council acted to constrain unchecked development and control growth to maintain a sustainable environment. Then-premier Frank Nicklin had supported it in the 1960s, and in the early 1980s, Bjelke-Petersen’s “minister for everything”, Russ Hinze, was positively gung ho about it. Seen from the outside, local government mergers can seem like sensible economic and social decisions, such as when a rural shire merges with its main service town, as in Widgee Shire and the city of Gympie merging in 1993. Continued page 6
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