Reilly to have tilt at council

KATINA CURTIS

FORMER Federal Labor candidate Neil Reilly announced yesterday he was standing for the council election with incumbent councillor Joyce Wheatley.

They are running as the Community First Group, with Mr Reilly holding the first spot on the ticket.

Cr Wheatley will run in the second spot. The remainder of the group consists of Mr Reilly’s son, Jack, Simon Mansfield and Lisa Pyle.

Cr Wheatley said the team’s strengths were youth, experience, business and education.

“Each of us will bring a set of skills that will enhance and balance the directions council will take to sustain our area and community,” she said.

Mr Reilly said the “real beauty” of the team was in its diversity.

“If you consider that some future councillors just want to put up a ‘For Sale’ sign in Kiama and others are solely there to halt any development whatsoever, we provide a sensible and rational middle ground that will steer a steady course for the community we have come to love and respect,” he said.

Mr Reilly runs an advertising business and has served in the army.

Jack, the youngest member of the group at age 18, finished his studies at Kiama High School last year and is now undertaking a diploma in children’s services at TAFE.

He has plans for expanding Kiama’s cultural influence, saying if he were elected he would seek to attract a second major retailer to the area, support a summer movie theatre and find an area for youth concerts that would not impinge on shopkeepers.

The other team members, Simon Mansfield and Lisa Pyle, live in Gerroa and are active in the community.

Mr Mansfield runs an internet publishing business specialising in science and outer space.

He attended the Federal Government’s 2020 summit earlier in the year and is passionate about getting business to see the potential of operating from regional areas.

Ms Pyle looks after her young children and is studying interior design at TAFE.

She is strongly involved with Gerringong Public School’s P&C and is the secretary of the Gerroa Community Association.