Amended local laws 

I am amazed to read in Changes Taking Effect as the Council adopts amended local laws. 

The fines, if your block is unsightly or overgrown. $1548 for a first offence, to $7740 for a third offence within twelve months, seems to be way overkill, especially in these financially strained times. Where are the compassionate warnings to start with?  How much will you be fined if you don’t mow your nature strip in front of your house, and make sure the mower strips are straight? Maybe we can claim to the Council for this mowing? 

From Mike Adamson 

Why Replace Councillor 

I’d like to comment on the recent article “Nominations now open for vacant councillor position”. Firstly, I do want to declare my opinion that they are part-time roles. I don’t see the need to have full-time positions so they can attend the openings or birthday celebrations of organisations. Therefore, a natural thought is why do we need a full-time councillor to represent a division that will need more than 7 months to show results from their input. Surely there is some coverage available internally at the council that can support the division’s constituents so they can be heard. I understand this is a law that the Fraser Coast Regional Council has no power to overturn, but I’d rather see the funds go towards local not for profit organisations.  

Mark Peters, Torquay 

Hire E -Scooters Hervey Bay 

I am concerned about hire E-Scooters that the Council has allowed to operate all across Hervey Bay. Now I read that after allowing them to operate the Council is going to rely on education, training and leave the enforcement of Laws of the use of E-Scooters to be handled by the Queensland Government under State Laws. 

I believe this is referring to Police enforcing the laws who don't have the man power or time to be chasing up the riders who I observe everyday breaking the law by going full speed on footpaths, bike ways and Pier, not wearing a helmet, more than one person on an E-Scooter and not slowing down when approaching pedestrians and giving way to them on our bikeways and footpaths. 

We have enough private owned E-Scooters to watch out for and their bad behaviour without the Council changing Laws to allow them and the hundreds of hire E -Scooters on our Footpaths, Bikeways, Pier and Jetties. 

This is a lazy attitude of our Council as their statement of Education and Training shows that there is a real danger from E -Scooters to the residents and visitors on the Fraser Coast. They are quite and when coming up from behind you, you don't hear them and if you had taken a step to right or left of you then you could be knocked down by the E- Scooter. I was coming out from a shop on the Esplanade and an E-Scooter just came out of nowhere and zoomed past in front of me. 

One young Mother told me that she was walking with her young child beside her and pushing a pram on the beachside footpath and two hire E-Scooters came at her from the other direction and did not slow down or form a single file and forced her to grab her child that was walking beside her and push the pram with her baby in it off the path. 

Another elderly lady told me she was walking on the Pier and three E-Scooters were riding abreast and full speed towards her and didn't slow down and forced people to the side of the Pier. 

I am sure there are other readers who have had a run in with a E -Scooter and have similar stories to tell. The Council allowed hundreds of E-Scooters to be placed and hired all over Hervey Bay and then tell residents they are going to change Council Laws to allow this bad behaviour to continue without a way of enforcing the Laws about the use of E-Scooters and past that problem onto the Police to enforce the Laws. 

So now people using E -Scooters have no worries about being pulled up or fined for their bad and unsafe use of the E -Scooter they are using. 

So many elderly residents and young children use out footpaths and bikeways and we need more responsible action by our Mayor and Councillors about their safety. 

I know a lot of riders observe the laws but if you are the one that is injured by an E -Scooter accident then you have a hospital visit, if you are employed than time off work if you have no leave available then without a pay coming in, a child may have to miss time from school, rehabilitation if you a more serious injury like a broken hip for example if you are elderly. 

This is all ongoing cost to the person injured or tax payers if the Public Hospital System is used. 

The death and injuries have increased dramatically over the years since E -Scooters were introduced in Queensland. 

Time for the Mayor and Councillors to re-think this decision and can people sue the Council for such an accident on their Footpaths, Bikeways, Pier and Jetties when a hire E - Scooter is at fault as the Council allowed their use on Council Land. Common sense again missing from our Mayor and Councillors.  

Delma Taylor

Hooning and juvenile delinquency 

I refer to the letters from Mr. Alan Host and Syl Mod regarding hooning and disturbing the peace in the area of Eli Waters and the Hervey Bay/Maryborough Highway. The ongoing nightly behaviour of immature motorists is totally unacceptable as well as failure of law enforcement to act. 

I note that while Adrian Tantari has failed to respond to contact by Syl Mod, right next to that article was an ad posted by Mr. Tantari, MP. “Building a better Hervey Bay” Say what?? If not the job of police or Mr. Tantari, then whose job, is it? I like the idea of incarcerating the perpetrators until such time, they can be escorted to observe their cars placed into a car crusher while it is being demolished into recyclable junk! Then released to find their way home. If laws must be enacted to accommodate such punishment, then let’s get with it!  

Further, if Mr. Tantari cannot find time to respond to a constituent complaint, then, perhaps the next election can solve that problem! Further, considering the escalating level of youth crime in Hervey Bay, I strongly suggest in no uncertain terms that Councillors and MPs visit Robert H Davis, and his Hard Yakka campus at Susan River to see firsthand how that operation works. 

I was privileged to be invited to observe a graduating class of former juvenile delinquents who were about to be released back into their parents’ care. I was highly impressed to have met and shook hands with each of those young ‘gentlemen’ whom I would have been proud to have called one of my own. The guy in the red shirt in Maryborough has been invited to pay a visit but to my knowledge, he has shown zero interest. 

I strongly recommend our councillors and MPs visit Hard Yakka as I did, with a goal of securing government funding to support that outstanding organization. 

To do less is to condone the nightly activities of hoons and juvenile delinquents in our community. That too can be remedied at the next council elections! 

Roger L Duncan - Urraween