01/06/2026
Subject: FINAL PLEA: Urgent Council Intervention and Community Support Required – Bellbrook Flying Fox Colony
To whom it may concern,
Purpose
This correspondence is a formal, final plea on behalf of the Bellbrook community regarding the ongoing, catastrophic health and safety crisis caused by the local Flying Fox colony.
For over three years, Kempsey Shire Council (KSC) has failed to provide meaningful, solution-based support, leaving our community’s most vulnerable residents to bear the brunt of this crisis.
Background and Community Impact
This is not a minor inconvenience; it is a severe, prolonged public health issue.
The density of the colony results in tons of faeces being deposited daily across a concentrated residential area. The impact on the daily lives and well-being of Bellbrook residents is untenable:
Public Health & Safety:
Residents cannot harvest or drink their rainwater, homegrown produce is contaminated, and pets have inexplicably fallen ill.
Vulnerable Demographics:
The fallout heavily impacts our elderly, Indigenous, handicapped, sick, and lower-income residents, as well as children.
Children and Education:
Children cannot safely play in their own backyards or use the local park equipment, which is constantly covered in excrement. The local school environment is similarly affected.
Financial Strain:
Property values have plummeted, and residents face ongoing financial burdens, such as being forced to purchase and run clothes dryers because laundry cannot be hung outside.
Environmental Degradation:
Local canopy trees are dying, and property is continuously damaged.
Despite the community providing extreme local case studies—including the heartbreaking circumstance of a terminally ill resident spending his final months in a caravan directly beneath the colony—KSC has failed to respond with the necessary urgency, empathy, or respect.
Failure of Engagement and Governance
The community fully understands that Flying Foxes are a protected species, and we have no desire to see animals harmed. We advocate for a collaborative, managed coexistence. However, KSC’s responses have been defensive and automated, repeatedly claiming nothing can be done.
Furthermore
Inadequate Consultation: It took nearly two years of community requests to secure a single engagement session with KSC. The session yielded no actionable outcomes, and the community was forced to repeatedly chase Council just to receive the meeting notes and recommendations.
Outdated Data:
State and Federal databases appear to have no updated entries for the Bellbrook colony since roughly 2019, suggesting management decisions are being made based on obsolete information.
Lack of Communication:
Standard correspondence to KSC is routinely met with automated replies, with actual follow-up from council representatives being exceedingly rare.
Requested Action
There are practical, non-harmful, and collaborative management solutions available that facilitate coexistence while protecting human health. We request that KSC immediately assign a dedicated liaison to the Bellbrook community to table these solutions and formulate an immediate action plan.
Please note that due to the lack of progress, this dossier and historical timeline have been forwarded to A Current Affair and various alternative media outlets. We hope this escalation serves as the necessary catalyst for KSC to fulfill its duty of care to the people of Bellbrook.
We await your urgent response.
Sincerely,
The Bellbrook Community
