QLD: Newsbriefs

AAP General News (Australia)
12-08-1998
QLD: Newsbriefs

FUND

BRISBANE, Dec 8 AAP - Charitable and community groups across Queensland have received
grants from the Gaming Machine Community Benefit Fund totalling $4.75 million.

The money would assist 638 projects and would enable the groups to purchase equipment such
as computers and upgrade their facilities, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer, Darryl
Briskey said.

The fund was set up in 1994 to ensure community organisations benefitted from the
introduction of poker machines in Queensland.

"The whole community benefits from these grants and its heartening to see part of the
gaming dollar being put to good causes," Mr Briskey said.

AAP jfs

DAMS

BRISBANE, Dec 8 AAP - No dams would be built in the environmentally sensitive Finch-Hatton
Gorge and St Helens Creek areas near Mackay, Environment, Heritage and Natural Resources
Minister Rod Welford said today.

Mr Welford, who visited the Finch-Hatton site, 56 km west of Mackay today, said: "Theres
been opposition to these dams on these sites for many years and we want to reassure residents
that they will not be built."

Mr Welford said work would commence soon on a Water Allocation and Management Plan for the
Pioneer Valley, taking a catchment-wide approach and involving a high degree of community
consultation.

AAP jfs

BRIDGE

ROCKHAMPTON, Qld, Dec 8 AAP - A search will resume tomorrow for a man who went missing
early today after jumping off a bridge into the Fitzroy River at Rockhampton.

Police said the missing man, Paul Blake, 27, a security officer, was last seen by a woman
who was walking on the Fitzroy River Bridge with him when he decided to go for a swim.

The woman raised the alarm at 4.50am (AEST), sparking an extensive search of the river and
its banks.

AAP Regdaily/jfs



end briefs

KEYWORD: BRIEFS QUEENSLAND

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