This article is the Peregian Beach Community Association’s response to irresponsible, uninformed media speculation about demolishing the surf club and building a large surf club hotel on protected, fragile dunes in Peregian Beach.
The residents and visitors to Peregian Beach want a safe beach.
Most of the time the beach is patrolled by paid professional life guards paid for by Noosa Council.
However, on Saturdays in the season between September and May, volunteer life savers patrol.
For providing volunteer life savers, Noosa Council leases the surf club building to Peregian Beach Surf Life Saving Club which is funded by the Peregian Beach Surf Life Saving Supporters Club.
The club pays a token rent for the lease but is able to use the building located in a prime location in Peregian Park to fund the provision of life saving services. It also allows the club to train nippers which is both a community and a child safety service.
The location of the clubhouse is as far to the east as is possible in the State Coastal Protection Zone and is on the building control line under the Noosa Plan. This is to avoid the loss of the building from coastal erosion, especially due to a cyclone, but also climate change.
While some have criticised the state of the building, it is currently fit for its purpose and the roof has recently been maintained and the building painted. The interior was gutted and refurbished recently in 2017.
Talk of rebuilding the Clubhouse further east on the dunes is irresponsible and is never going to happen.
Unlike other locations Peregian Beach does not have a rocky headland on which to locate a clubhouse. The location is a sand dune subject to erosion as has occurred previously when an earlier clubhouse was lost.
The location of the clubhouse requires state government approval
And the state will not approve changing the reserve required for a building on the dunes.
Surf Life Saving Queensland would not agree to place the clubhouse at risk by such an application, having seen the impact of coastal erosion on other clubhouses.
The president of the surf club has stated that the aim of the recently revived club is to build membership as opposed to a new clubhouse and to attain financial stability.
Put simply, the revived club does not have the $5 million quoted as required for a new clubhouse but has nine more years of the 10-year lease of the existing building.
If any further proof was needed, last week, Noosa chief executive officer Scott Waters stated that council had “approved a 10 year lease to the club last year and there are no plans from council for any redevelopment.”
If the community wants to maintain a volunteer life saving service at Peregian Beach, it should work with the surf club and not other fringe groups from outside Noosa Shire who have other conflicting agendas.
