Category: Community Meetings

Paluma & District Community Association Executive Meeting

The PDCA will be having its executive meeting on Saturday 28th at 5pm at the hall. All residents are welcome to attend and engage with the agenda though voting rights are for executive members only.

The meeting will start promptly at 5pm with drinks available for purchase at the bar after closure of the meeting.

Bring along some bar snacks to share if you wish.

Notice of PDCA Annual General Meeting, May 24, 2025

Members (and prospective members) are advised that the Annual General Meeting of the Paluma & District Community Association Inc. will be held on:

Saturday, May 24, 2025, at 12pm for a BBQ lunch followed by the AGM at 1:15pm in the Community Hall

Nominations are open for all Executive Committee positions. Nominations should be forwarded to any member of the Executive Committee or by email to PalumaPDCA@gmail.com. Please use the nomination forms, which can be downloaded here.

Positions are:

  • President, 
  • 1 or 2 Vice-Presidents
  • Secretary
  • Treasurer
  • General Committee members (numbers flexible)  

Members are reminded that Annual Subscriptions are now due and should be paid prior to the commencement of the AGM.   Membership is $45.00 Please use the subscription form here to submit your dues. New members are more than welcome and should use the same form.

Please note that you must be a PDCA member to nominate someone to the Committee or vote for any Committee member.

The AGM will be followed immediately by a normal General Meeting with the new Committee.

AGM AGENDA

  1. Opening – circulation of attendance sheet
  2. Apologies
  3. Minutes of previous AGM April 24th, 2021
  4. President’s Report
  5. Treasurer’s report
  6. Election of Officers for 2025-2026
  7. Election of Auditor for 2025-2026
  8. Close of Annual General Meeting

Normal General Meeting Agenda

Normal General Meeting Agenda

  1. Open General Meeting
  2. Proposed Events/Fund-raising for the coming year
  3. Any other business
  4. Close of General Meeting

Community Meetings and BBQ now scheduled for April 12th.

Prior to the meetings below the PDCA will provide a BBQ lunch at noon, April 12th at the Community Hall

A community meeting to review our experiences during & after the February extreme weather event will now be held on Saturday, 12th of April, commencing at 1 pm in the Paluma Community Hall. The objective is to record lessons learnt for the future, discuss known problems & see what we can do to improve how we manage such events. All members of the community are encouraged to attend. See agenda here.

If you are unable to attend but would like to have a specific issue included for discussion, feel free to contact Charlie Allen, Peter Cooke, Anneshka Brown or Jamie Oliver to let them know.

There will also be a regular meeting of the PDCA Council at 3pm, after the community meeting. This PDCA meeting will cover various ongoing items (see agenda below). While these meetings have traditionally been considered as business meetings attended only by the elected members of the Council/Executive, we welcome any residents to attend and to raise any items that they would like the PDCA to consider in addition to what is already on the agenda. Here is the proposed agenda.

Postponement of Meetings this Saturday

As a result of the recent additional rains, and the closure of the Star River Bridge on the inland access route, the upcoming Community Meeting, PDCA Meeting and PDCA BBQ have all been postponed until the following weekend – March 29th. The times and places are the same:

Paluma Community Hall March 29th

  • PDCA BBQ at 12 pm
  • Community Meeting at 1 pm
  • PDCA Meeting at 3 pm

Community BBQ and PDCA Meeting this Saturday

In addition to the Community Meeting to review experiences and lessons learned from the recent rains (Saturday at 1pm) the PDCA will be hosting a BBQ lunch at the Community Hall at 12 pm before the meeting.

There will also be a regular meeting of the PDCA Council at 3pm, after the community meeting. This PDCA meeting will cover various ongoing items (see agenda below). While these meetings have traditionally been considered as business meetings attended only by the elected members of the Council/Executive, we welcome any residents to attend and to raise any items that they would like the PDCA to consider in addition to what is already on the agenda. Here is the proposed agenda.

AGENDA

  1. Apologies
  2. Action Arising
    • History project – mining and timber history; “What to see and do in Paluma” flyers and linked QR code.
    • Monitoring of Telstra generator and back-up battery
    • Updating Paluma online presence:  PDCA activities; Paluma.org update; Facebook page;
    • Access to PRFB funds to share costs in hall upgrades eg: Solar panels and battery storage
  3. Suggested PDCA actions arising from previous Community Review Meeting on lessons learned during February’s extreme rain event
  4. Paluma Community Information and News network options – for urgent and non-urgent items
  5. Future events and Hall bookings
  6. Treasurer’s Report
  7. Any Other Business
  8. Confirm next meeting date – Annual General Meeting (election of officers) to be followed by exec meeting

Community Meeting to review experiences and lessons learned during the recent rain event

A community meeting to review our experiences during & after the February extreme weather event will be held on Saturday the 22nd of March commencing at 1 pm in the Paluma Community Hall. The objective is to record lessons learnt for the future, discuss known problems & see what we can do to improve how we manage such events. All members of the community are encouraged to attend.

Charlie Allen

Update on last Sunday’s Meeting with the Mayor

As mentioned in the last “Paluma in the Rain” update, we had a visit from the acting Mayor (Councillor Ann-Maree Greaney) and Zac Daws, Local Disaster Coordinator last Sunday. In preparation for the meeting, Peter Cooke wrote up a list of issues for discussion which included:

  1. lack of news on the state of the range road and the schedule for repairs
  2. lack of adequate backup power for the Telstra mobile phone tower
  3. need for a formal landing area near the village for helicopters
  4. need for rubbish collection as soon as possible
  5. need for road maintenance to Ewan and Hervey’s Range road
  6. request to increase bandwidth of the TCC wifi link at the Community Hall

The mayor noted that many of these items were outside their immediate responsibility but undertook to pass our concerns on to the relevant authority, and to respond in writing to those issues it was in a position to act on.

The following response was sent to Charlie Allen and Ross Hyne on Monday.

Paluma in the Rain – Final update

The sun has been shining in Paluma for 3 days now, and while the ground is still soggy and access to and from the village is for higher clearance vehicles, the Village is beginning to recover from the trials and tribulations of the last two weeks. We will provide further updates on the recovery process and efforts to identify how things might be handled even better during future events, but for now Paluma is no longer in the rain. In fact I had to go out and water the Impatiens at the Community Hall on Sunday that were wilting after over two days of full sun.

Probably the best news since the last update is the power was restored to Paluma on February 11th, and with it came Telstra mobile phone access, water treatment, cold and frozen food storage capacity and relief from anxiety about dwindling fuel for generators. That can do a lot to raise spirits.

While most residents report that food is not a major issue, the quality and variety has definitely not yet returned to normal. Food runs by Sam Stedman and other residents returning to the village on soggy roads via Mt Fox or Hervey’s Range Road has helped alleviate this and to maintain a table of various food items at the Community Hall for residents who were running short.

Currently the key factor preventing a return to near-normalcy is access to Townsville and Ingham via the range road. The alternate route via Herveys range has only just opened up officially and it is quite rough in spots. Annoyingly, the bridge over the Star River still has a road closed sign at either end, even though it is now officially open with some restrictions for heavy trucks. A moderate clearance 2wd drive made it back today (Monday) without any problems but small cars with small wheels and low clearance would probably bottom out on the rougher sections. Our trip back to Townsville today took a little over 3 hours, which is twice the normal trip time when using the Paluma range road. The state of the road to Inghan via Mt Fox is reported to be “very rough”.

The Road to Ewan has some areas of severe erosion, but they are clearly marked with witches hats.
The bridge over the Star River is high and dry but heavy trucks are subject to restrictions and there is a warning regarding possible flooding.

There has been much speculation on the severity of damage to the range road and the timetable for Transport and Main Roads (TMR) to effect repairs. On Sunday we were contacted by the TMR engagement group who committed to provide bi-weekly updates (Tuesday and Friday) via their email list on repairs and timetables starting tomorrow. All updates will also be posted on Paluma.org. We were informed that the main concern was an area of undercut road and downhill landslip near Wolfram Creek that will require a considerable volume of fill to be brought in. More details should be available tomorrow.

As a precautionary measure, Paluma received a major delivery of bottled drinking water which is available at the Hall. Our local treatment plant is currently working however any future events that increase turbidity at the source weir might reduce its capacity and result in a need for supplemental water.

On Sunday we had visits from support workers who provided assistance to any residents who were in need of financial assistance as a result of the rains. Representatives from Qld Housing also came up in case there were any residents who required re-housing.

We also had a visit from the acting Mayor (Councillor Ann-Maree Greaney) and Zac Daws, Local Disaster Coordinator who met with a group of residents from Paluma and Hidden Valley community at the hall. A separate post will provide a report and insights arising from that community meeting.

Jamie Oliver and Juanita Poletto