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Rates up but savings found Noosa Mayor Frank Wilkie said community expectations were respected and economic realities faced in drafting the 2025-26 council budget, to be adopted on Monday. “A Noosa residential homeowner on the minimum general rate will pay an extra $2.35 a week on their total rates notice, as part of a proposed 6.5 per cent increase to cover rising costs and maintain service levels,” he said. Mayor Wilkie said minimising cost-of-living increases on households and delivering on the community desire for good services were key priorities. “Local Governments have been hit hard by price increases for the materials, wages and services needed to deliver core business,” Cr Wilkie said. “To minimise impacts on ratepayers, councillors and staff worked through 10 budget workshops and identified savings across all departments. “Rates rises for most residential ratepayers were limited by lifting rates for Short-Term Accommodation (STA) properties. “We kept both residential and STA rates in the dollar to levels that are still below that of others in the region.” Cr Wilkie said annual increases allowed Council to build the infrastructure the community needed. Continued page 2
An upgrade of Noosa Aquatic Centre under the budget will make it even better for the Goldfish class and teacher Justine Allen. (Supplied)
Project blowout A construction quote blow-out from $1.8 million to $3.6 million has put a halt to the planned extension of Katie Rose Cottage Hospice at Doonan. The development work includes increasing the number of guest rooms from three to five and a new nursing station, almost doubling the size of the hospice within the property’s three acres.
“It is proving to be a long and challenging story. The two new rooms would have allowed us to have an additional 40 to 50 guests a year, in keeping with growing demand for professional palliative care locally,” the charity hospice’s Chair Les Godwin told Noosa Today. “In January 2022 we were allocated a $1.5 million Federal grant for the work. We went through the lengthy planning exercise of seeking council
approvals and we spent $300,000 of our own money getting to the stage of submitting the plans for costings by a quantity surveyor which then came in, unexpectedly, at $3.6 million. “This blew us out of the park and as chair of the board I stopped all proceedings at that point, to review the plans. “Queensland Health also advised implications
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for changing operations aligned with becoming a private hospital, that doesn’t fit our objectives of a home away from home model of palliative care.” Mr Godwin said their advice was that other requirements would include a commercial kitchen instalment and employing a lifeguard for the residential-size swimming pool. Continued page 4
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By Jim Fagan