It's not quite Lazarus with a triple bypass, but it's great news for the North West, the Julia Creek Dirt N Dust Festival has been saved, though it may not have a triathlon.
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After the special meeting in Julia Creek last weekend, they had seven days to form a committee.with time not on their side as the paperwork to wind up the association was to begin August 1.
Overwhelming support came through with 56 membership applications received within the week and 11 expressions of interest for the executive and or management committee. So that means all positions advertised have a nominated person name beside it, so it will now be up to the community to cement their vote at the annual general meeting on August 14.
Outgoing president Nathan James-Laneyrie said the continued risk and uncertainty of COVID-19 had originally made planning one of the biggest volunteer run event in Outback Queensland a huge challenge.
"But the main reason was getting people to put up their hand to be on the management committee, it was not lack of people putting their hand up to volunteer at the festival as they do it Julia Creek-style and come out of the wood work for any event or festival that is staged," he said.
The newly appointed committee will set the new vision for the Festival and there is still uncertainty whether it will have a triathlon.
Ideas were on the table last week looking at external private enterprise coming in to take on the Triathlon side and the community just run their races, local bullride and possibly add a locally run "Dirty and Dusty Run".
At the community meeting, it was agreed the old business model does not fit the current community so the time has come for new blood, new ideas and a whole lot of passion and enthusiasm.
Outgoing committee member Margie Ryder said Tourism Events Queensland, McKinlay Shire Council, South32 and other stakeholders have invested millions of dollars into this festival , so for the community to be able to step up again is an incredible achievement from a small rural remote town.
"To ensure the Festival's direction stayed local, a constitution change was made last week where it was stipulated that the president of the association had to be a resident of the McKinlay Shire," Ms Ryder said.
"To our delight we are today announcing Robbie Hick who lives at Saint Elmo station in Julia Creek, has put his nomination forward to take on the role as president to lead the newly appointed committee and help set new vision for the festival. No other nominations were received for this position, so it will just be a formality at the AGM for the Dirt n Dust Members to now formally vote him."
Former President Stephen Malone who was voted in 1999 and served until 2020 said the past committee should be proud of what they achieved.
"We had a very clear business and action plan to lay the foundations for the future as we all agreed that the days of volunteering has changed and basically we knew no one would be mad enough to do what we did," Mr Malone said.
"We invested over $400,000 getting us venue ready with the purchase of toilets, chutes, arena, land, tables, chairs and that was without the funding from governments to build the long awaited venue after 25 years, this is part of the Julia Creek Community Precinct- Home of the Dirt n Dust."
Starting its life as a yarn over a round of drinks at the local town and country club, the Julia Creek Dirt n Dust Festival was imagined as a way to put the small Queensland town on the map.
The idea was born to start Australia's first outback triathlon in 1994 - that year saw 15 people tackle the race and 27 years later the little town of Julia Creek was to attract 3000 people for a full weekend of events.
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