DON’T TRASH OUR BEACHES

THEY say it only takes one bad apple to spoil the lot — but when it comes to Palm Beach it only takes one stray doggie doodoo to spoil the view.

As Gold Coasters it is fair to say we love our animals — and our beaches.

We take our dogs to breakfast, refer to them as ‘fur babies’ and generally treat them as part of our family.

It goes without saying we also want them to enjoy the best the Gold Coast has to offer — a bit of sand between the paws on our beaches.

As a community, we are avid users of our off-leash dog parks and beaches, facilities that are not as common in other cities.

It is concerning therefore that residents and tourists alike are arriving at these offleash areas to discover that the people who should be treating it as a privilege are treating it like, well, you know.

With over 50 public submissions to the Gold Coast City Council on the serious health and safety concerns at these offleash areas it is clear something needs to change.

Clearly the majority of dog owners treat these beaches with respect but it only take a few to turn one of the Gold Coast’s most loved communal areas into a cesspit of faeces and rubbish, with dog attacks to boot.

To make matters worse we have been here before.

In 2015 Southern Palm Beach was labelled the “Gold Coast’s stinkiest beach’ with over 48 bags of dog poo found in less than an hour.

At the time Surfrider Foundation spokesman Chris Butler, feared the lagoon behind the beach was contaminated.

“The E coli levels were off the Richter (scale) then,’’ he told the Bulletin. “You couldn’t go anywhere near that area near the lagoon it was so foul.”

If we want to preserve our great outdoors more clearly has to be done.

After all, nobody wants the title of the Gold Coast’s smelliest beach.

So lets clean up our act.