LOCAL NEWS
Thursday April 14, 2016
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Nominations for Tweed Shire Council now open CANDIDATE AND group registrations are now
open for the 2016 Local Council Elections, currently scheduled for Saturday, September 10.
Ordinary elections for Councillors are held every four years, and the NSW Electoral Commission has been engaged to conduct this year’s Tweed Shire Council Election. General Manager Troy Green said Council preparations were already underway. “With Council amalgamations and mergers being a focus for the State Government it was thought elections may have been delayed until March 2017,” Mr Green said. “However, Local Government Minister Paul Toole recently advised State Parliament that the scheduled 2016 Local Government Elections will be split between September 2016 and March 2017 in order to accommodate the Government’s merger program.”
Candidates and groups must register with the NSW Electoral Commission (NSWEC) before accepting political donations or incurring expenditure for an election. All candidates and groups must appoint an official agent at the time of registration and notify the NSWEC of the agent’s appointment. Registering for an election is a separate process from being nominated as a candidate for an election. Nominations open on Monday 1 August for candidates to contest the Tweed local government election. A Candidate Information Presentation, Candidate Handbook and Nomination Forms will be available for candidates from June. For more information on the 2016 Local Government Election visit www.votensw.info For more information on becoming a candidate, call the NSW Electoral Commission on 1300 022 011. For general enquiries, call 1300 135 736.
New skate park to feature top local riders
SOME OF the district’s leading skaters will turn on the style for a demonstration as part of this Thursday’s official opening of the Knox Park Youth Precinct.
The National Youth Week event, being held at the Murwillumbah park from 1pm to 4pm, will feature a demonstration including local skating icon Tony Lawrence. The demonstration will be held at the new skate park from 1.30pm, while free skating workshops will be held from 1pm to 3.30pm. The free day in the park will also include songs and tales by storyteller Annie Bryant. Celebrations will culminate with an official ceremony at 3.30pm, when the Federal Minister for Regional Development, Fiona Nash, and Tweed Deputy Mayor Gary Bagnall open the Youth Precinct. For more information, visit www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/KnoxParkUpgrade
Asbestos scare could delay cop shop CONSTRUCTION OF the new Tweed
Heads Police Station has been delayed after a range of building materials were found to contain asbestos during excavations. Tweed MP Geoff Provest told the media that the asbestos issue could delay construction by several months and he’s warning the asbestos could also blow out the $13.3 million project budget. Mr Provest said it could take another four weeks before contractor Brookfield Global Integrated Solutions reveals a solution to the issue. “They’ve found previous builders have dumped asbestos into the ground,” Mr Provest said. “So they’ve got to work out a system for removal. Mr Provest said nothing could be done until all
OH&S was adhered to. The asbestos is believed to be in the site’s soil and Mr Provest said he was unsure how deep the issue could be. “No one’s been able to tell me whether it’s two tonnes of contaminated soil or 10 tonnes,” he said. It’s believed the demolition of the building which stood there decades ago was the source of the asbestos. “I’ve been advised that the previous structure replaces another structure in the early 70s,” Mr Provest said. “It was then common practice to dig a big hole, dump it all in and then fill it back up again.”
An artists impression of the new Tweed Heads Police Station which has hit a snag
Tyalgum Cup see record ladies riding By Debbie Cosier
LAST WEEKEND saw the biggest ever women’s
field in the popular Tyalgum Cup, a reflection of the growing interest in women’s road cycling and racing in the region.
The Women’s A/B Division event was exciting and highly skilled. Ten riders broke away from the bunch on Bald Mountain and stayed together for most of the 86km twolap course. With 20 km to go, U23 female national time trial champion and former World Tour rider Emily Roper made a break and High5 Dream Team’s Lucy Kennedy chased. The group split up with the first three riders riding home on their own and small groups coming in after that. Emily came in first and Lucy, second. The event’s popularity reflects the rising tide of women’s road riding in the region. Cycling clubs from Brisbane, Gold Coast and Murwillumbah, all part of Cycling Queensland, have responded to this by providing more open events that cater to women. Such events include the Logan Sizzling Summer Series, the Hamilton Pine Rivers Wheelers series, the Mardi Bartlett Classic and the Murwillumbah Women’s Series. At present, women can compete in female-only open races at least once per month at various locations between Brisbane and Murwillumbah. Cycling Queensland has also assessed the viability of creating a 2016 women’s division of the Queensland Road Team Series. Rider quotas for the events continue to rise in response to enthusiasm from female riders. Tylagum Cup organisers, Murwillumbah Cycle Club, place a high priority on providing quality weekly club racing for females. Women’s Development Officer Simone Kendrick says that after the She Rides introductory program to cycling a few years ago, the club wanted to encourage more women of every ability to give weekly racing a try.
“Female-only races were out of the question at weekly club races because you can’t provide great, competitive racing while you’re building up the numbers and they are still fluctuating. So we formalised a system of parallel grading, where Men’s B is also Women’s A, Men’s C is also Women’s B and so on, and female riders receive equal acknowledgement. If there are only a couple of women, we acknowledge First Female. If there are a good number of female competitors, they are acknowledged on a separate women’s podium. This means that we always provide great racing for both men and women.” These recent changes have led to 40 new women joining the Murwillumbah Cycle Club, the majority of its 2015/16 membership growth. “More and more females are riding bikes for fun, fitness and freedom, and more and more women are racing,” says Kendrick. “It is pleasant to see women riders looking fantastic, riding like champions and changing the face of cycling.” It’s interesting to note that more than 50 women competed this year which was a marked contrast to 2010 when only six females raced across the entire event. Twenty-seven competed in the female-only A/B Division and equal numbers of women and men competed in the C/D Division.
www.tweedvalleyweekly.net.au
U23 female national time trial champion and a former World Tour athlete Emily Roper has a convincing win in Women’s A at the Tyalgum Cup.