Community & Business
1 December, 2022
Friends of Felton comes to an end
In August 2012, Friends of Felton (FOF) received a letter from the Queensland Premier at that time, Campbell Newman, saying “…no company, whatever it chooses to call itself, has a right to develop a mining operation in the Felton Valley.”
The Newman letter effectively removed the threat of coal mining from the Felton Valley and in the process handed the Felton community an historic victory.
However, winding-up the Friends of Felton organisation was not possible in 2012 because from March of that year it had taken responsibility for running the Felton Food Festival.
This one-day festival ran for six years and was hugely successful, but ultimately it proved to be too exhausting for a small community.
On 5 March 2018, a meeting of Friends of Felton members decided to cease the organisation’s commitment to the Felton Food Festival.
Since the festival had operated as a sub-committee of FOF, this decision led to the suspension of the Festival and in the process removed a major reason for keeping Friends of Felton operational.
A little more than ten years after its victory over the mining proposal, members of Friends of Felton have decided to wind-up the organisation and transfer its surplus assets to the Felton Hall Association.
Speaking to the wind-up motion a few weeks ago, President of Friends of Felton, Mr Ian Whan, said Friends of Felton had achieved the core outcome for which it was formed.
He added that its final act of guaranteeing the long-term sovereignty and financial future of the Felton Hall might be seen as one of its greatest legacies.
