Eurobodalla Council "prattles" on about the region's critical dependence on tourism but when it was approached by a Tuross Head resident, drawing their attention to the abundance fire and flood debris that covered the Main Beach, ahead of the prime tourism season, Council said "Nup" :
Above: the default response from Council sent to a Tuross resident and signed by a Council trainee. Is this what Council means when they promote themselves as #allkindsofnatural ? Source
Incensed by the response that was posted to the Tuross Head Notice Board the Tuross Head community decided that if Council "didn't give a rat's bum" then they would take it upon themselves to clean up their beach.
Over sixty residents made their way down to the Main Beach today (December 6th, 2020) with rakes, buckets and gloves and transformed a debris littered beach into one that they were proud of in readiness for the upcoming tourism season.
Above: some of the sixty plus Tuross Head residents who took matters into their own hands to clean up their beach in readiness for the upcoming summer season.
"This mob have lost the plot. Ferg Thomson knew the importance of tourism to Tuross when he was Mayor. He found money to keep our life guards. It used to be a Can Do council. Now they won't do anything", said one old timer, raking another bucketful.
"The disgusting thing is that the letter was sent out by a trainee. The supervisor didn't even have the guts to put their own name on the letter".
"Our grandkids are going to enjoy this. What was here before was horrible. It looked like no-one cared".
Below are photos of the volume of debris along the Main Beach. The debris, comprising mainly wood swept down the Tuross River by this year's floods is predominantly sharp sticks and blackened from fire affected forests upstream.
"If Covid restrictions want us to be at least a beach towel apart this summer we knew we had better do something", said another volunteer.
In all the community volunteers spent an hour and a half on the beach and transformed it to this:
Above: What a difference a day makes. Photos by Sue Hutcheson
The effort today saw two thirds of the beach cleaned up. A second round is proposed for next Sunday (10am til 12pm) to work around the Mt Everest area and along Caravan Park beach. Congratulations to Sue Hutcheson for using the power of Social Media to reach out to her community. The result by so many is astounding. Sue says of next week's cleanup "Bring Rakes, and TARPS. They were incredibly useful for piling up the abundance of little stuff and dragging across the sand. And Water." The Tuross Head RFS has been notified that there are now stacks of wood on the beach in case anyone might decide to set fire to one. The mounds have been located away from the grassy dunes. Lighting of Beach Fires in Eurobodalla is Prohibited.
