The indomitable Amy Glade of Capalaba

Amy Glade is an ‘octogenarian with determination’ and nominated for a 2019 Australia Day Award. Her volunteering services for Capalaba and the Redlands Community has been recognised since 1986. Citizen Journalist Adel Berridge interviews Amy Glade to get her story.

Q. In your own words Amy, who are you?

A. Well, you know, I’m 88 now. I’m just an ordinary Australian but Kent Bayley of 4CRB radio has told his listeners I’m extraordinary because of my voluntary work with the community, nature and our precious Australian wild life. I never expected to be nominated for an Australia Day award. I retired from volunteering work force on my birthday in December last year.

Q. Kent Bayley said this about you “Now I know there are many in the community who give their all but there is a special place in my heart for the indomitable Amy Glade of Capalaba as she is living proof of the words of Winston Churchill…..Never, never, never give up”. Would you say that is correct?

A. Yes he did say that and he referred to me as Amy’s Army. He related this to my many battles with the Redland City Council about preserving the very things that bring quality of life to people while it appears the Council has been intent on destroying the area with endless land clearing and allowing concrete to spread like some rampant disease or wild fire, just like the Gold Coast. Kent actually said that on air.

Q. You were born in Bundaberg but have an American accent. Why is that?

A. If you say so. It doesn’t sound American to me. I had an older brother in Canada and I would never have left Australia if not to meet him after an absence of more than a decade. My parents separated when I was very young. Dad took the two oldest and Mum took the two youngest. My brother was raised by members of father’s family while I remained in Ingham being raised by a cane farming family until my mother, who I did not recognise, having met a new partner, came to collect me when I was 7 or 8 years old to live and attend school in Mount Isa along with my younger brother and sister.
In 1955 I traveled by ship to meet my brother and family in Canada where I lived and worked for ten years, after which I moved to Washington D.C. I worked at the Australian Embassy where I stayed for some years moving on to the UN in New York City until my brother was killed in a plane crash in Quebec. I then applied for work at the World Bank in Washington D.C. where I worked and married a US citizen who had been attached to US Air Force Intelligence in Germany end WWII as CIA agent. He was fluent in German and Spanish.
For medical reasons, I decided to take early retirement from the World Bank and retired ‘back home’ to Australia not knowing where we would live.

Q. Why Capalaba?

A. I was on home leave visiting my sister in Mt Gravatt with my husband. The bank gave staff home leave benefits every two years to visit family in one’s own home country, so I decided to take resettlement paid for by the bank to Capalaba in July 1986. I was shown many homes by real estate agents in a short space of time nearing end of holiday, and was attracted to the home I decided to purchase in Capalaba, not because of the house, which had rooms too small for my liking, but because of the tall, majestic koala food trees lining the back fence used at the time by koalas that walked from the TAFE grounds through the park to trees behind neighbour, then into my yard of trees. Increasing their habitat by planting an oasis of trees by our koala group, which had been much used in the local park. That was until developers at the end of adjoining Ingham St were permitted to destroy the cluster of towering, majestic food trees officially listed as habitat in council records, but sadly replaced with cluster housing up to the school fence thereby assuring koala extinctions, the loss still being felt by locals today in 2019.

Q. Of all your work in Redlands, what is the one thing that you will never forget?

A. The car wreckers. Began with e-mail messages from unknown resident complaining of stench from Coolwynpin Creek where oil and other waste from squashed vehicles were affecting the quality of life. The opening over the creek bed was used to dump waste. A friend accompanied me with a camera to record pollution. Together with the evidence in my possession Capalaba MP Michael Choi accompanied me to Council to enforce the company complied with State government environmental regulations on safely disposing of waste material.

Another was RAW SEWAGE spilling into Coolwynpin Creek, Capalaba. Manager of Crotona Rd units appeared one morning at my door complaining about being unable to rent units due to stench from polluted waterway asking I write a letter to Editor of local newspaper. Over one weekend sewage overflowed into waterway where entire surface was covered with growth. Recall seeing an empty beer keg from then Soccer Club perched on top. Machinery was brought in to remove growth from surface and received apologies from RSC’s Water and Waste dept. Answered a call one morning from head of water and waste offering to give me a tour of the sewage works between Redland Bay Rd and the creek….surprised to see how close to the waterway its located. Soon after, larger pipes were installed bringing an end to polluting overflows.

Q. You would have seen many significant development issues. Anything in particular that shocked you?

A. Local politicians should hang their heads in shame over some of the park developments.
Keith Street Reserve, Capalaba. Asian developer built units on what was known by locals as ‘The Bowen Street Bush’ and it was a great loss to locals. Koalas carried their young from Valentine Park to the site that had an underground spring and of great value to the community. Residents in Daveson Street then asked for native street trees. Then a housing estate from corner Finucane/Old Cleveland Rd East to Dennison Crt had no green space in between, prompting me to join the late Margaret Harvey along with housing commission residents, in requesting space for children’s playground and bushland block beside it, as children had nowhere to play and used driveways or the road. The purchase of these two blocks was the birth of our environmental levy….that came close to being sold until change of heart prior to last local government election.

Q. You would have lived in Capalaba when the Bunnings Warehouse development on Brewer St was a very hot issue. What do you remember about that?

A. Oh yeah, it was huge. The David & Goliath battle. Bunnings had purchased nine houses on the residential street. I joined residents to fight against it taking over their street which was won in the Land & Environment Court. Snr Judge Tony Skoien said NO to using any ResA land but at end court case changed ResA land to ResB…thereby ensuring local residents retained their street. That was a couple of decades ago. Today, the land is still vacant. It wouldn’t surprise me if they gave it another shot though. Uni students from Griffith & Q’ld viewed my files on this issue.

Q. You are now nominated for a pretty prestigious award that only a few amongst us can claim to have attained. It must be more than just planting trees for kids or koalas. What have you done personally that actioned this nomination?

A. Well that’s a loaded question. Its years of work. It would take pages and pages. I will have to email all that to you. It basically started when a developer bulldozed what was a water flowing Coolwynpin Creek with water birds and platypus. It’s all polluted now. I will say though my first award, presented by our first Mayor of Redland Shire, Eddie Santagiuliana, in June, 1995, with the words “For your personal contribution in preserving and enhancing the Redland Environment”…remains closest to my heart and value, knowing what I did to deserve it.

Amy Glade volunteering work

A brief record of voluntary work by Amy Glade – 1986 to 2018.

• Environmental Defenders Office in Brisbane City regarding development in Capalaba
• Protests include development in ‘Special Protection’ wetland area under Koala Coast Policy on a wildlife corridor
• Koala habitat protection on numerous occasions
• Choir set up in aged care facility
• Clean up of parks, garden care including planting and watering, shade and weed eradication
• Roadside tree planting with approval from Mayor Santaguiliana
• Bush care include Valantine St Reserve, Capalaba; Keith Street Reserve, Capalaba; Birkdale Bush Care Group Brewer St, Capalaba.

This article is accredited to Citizen Journalist Adel Berridge.

Redlands2030 – 15 January 2019