Aboriginal Shire of Palm Island


The Aboriginal Shire of Palm Island is a special local government area of Queensland, Australia, managed by the Palm Island Aboriginal Shire Council under a Deed of Grant in Trust granted to the community on 27 October 1986. The local council was previously the Palm Island Community Council, which had far fewer powers. The shire is located on the Palm Island group, off the north Queensland coast near the city of Townsville.
Ten of the twelve Islands in the Greater Palm Island Group come under the control of the Shire – Palm Island, Fantome Island, Curacoa Island, Havannah Island, Brisk Island, Esk Island, Falcon Island, Eclipse Island, Barber Island, Fly Island – plus a few rocks, but neither Orpheus Island nor Pelorus Island, are within its borders, and Albino Rock belongs to Orpheus Island National Park.
At the local government elections on 28 March 2020, a new mayor, Mislam Sam, was elected.

History

The path to self-governance

After the Land Act Amendment Act 1982 had established a system for granting a Deed of Grant in Trust rather than land title to Indigenous councils, the Community Services Act 1984 was effected in order to transfer land currently under the administration of the Queensland Government to locally elected Aboriginal councils, giving Aboriginal councils powers and responsibilities similar to other local governments in Queensland.
On 30 March 1985, the Palm Island Aboriginal Council, with five councillors elected by the community, was established. Under the Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders Act 1985, Palm Island was among the first DOGITs received. It meant that the new autonomous Council would hold a perpetual lease over the former Aboriginal reserve lands on Great Palm Island and the ten surrounding islands of the group.
The council area was transferred on 27 October 1986 to the trusteeship of the council under a DOGIT.
Self-appointed "president" of Palm Island, Jeremy Geia, symbolically declared independence from Australia in 2001. The "Peoples Democratic Republic of Palm Island" was an expression of grievances against the Australian and Queensland Governments for neglect of Palm Islanders.
The Palm Island Council received qualified audits for the financial years 1999–2000, 2002–03 and 2003–04, and unqualified audits for 2000–01 and 2001–02. In October 2003 the Council was dissolved and an administrator was appointed until the March 2004 election. This occurred due to a range of governance and financial management issues, including: insolvency, financial mismanagement, poor records and decision-making processes, and a failure to deliver major infrastructure projects. In addition, according to the Palm Island Select Committee, the local government elections of 1997, 2000, and 2004 demonstrated a lack of continuity in office-bearers, a relatively small number of voters combined with a large number of candidates, and a trend in some families for a number of relatives to stand for election.
Lex Wotton, who would later go on to lead the 2004 Palm Island riots, had resigned in June 2003 after becoming dissatisfied with the Council's practices.
At the conclusion of the administrator's term, a handover report was presented to the newly elected Council, which included: allocation of specific portfolios for Councillors and the establishment of committee structures to ensure functional decision-making, appointment of a financial controller for 12 months and the engagement of a Human Resource Management consultant.

2005: Council becomes a shire

On 1 January 2005, under the Local Government Act 2004 , the Palm Island Aboriginal Council became the Palm Island Aboriginal Shire Council, on a par with other local councils in Queensland. This reconstitution into a Shire Council formed part of the Meeting Challenges, Making Choices strategy developed in response to the Cape York Justice Study undertaken by Justice Fitzgerald QC in November 2001.
Delena Foster became Mayor on 16 December 2006, taking over from Erykah Kyle. She had previously been chairwoman of the Community Council from 2001 to 2003, and had stood as an Independent candidate for the electoral district of Townsville in the 2004 election.
The structure of the Aboriginal Shire Council was criticised in the 2000 Dillon Report for the following reasons:
The Shire's core business is the provision of housing. It conducted an audit of its houses and the people living in them in 2007, finding found that 120 new homes were needed. However, the Council primarily relies on income from rent and Government subsidies and can only afford to build one or two new houses a year.

Libraries

The Palm Island Shire Council operate the Bwgcolman Indigenous Knowledge Centre at 1 Main Street, Palm Island.

Chairmen and mayors