General News
20 November, 2025
$5m safer surf club underway
CONSTRUCTION of a new $5 million clubhouse for the Ellis Beach Surf Life Saving Club is well underway, with completion expected by March next year.
President Hamish Jenkins said the project had been a decade in the making, following an incident involving young nippers crossing the Captain Cook Highway that prompted a central safety review.
“The process started about 10 years ago,” Mr Jenkins said. “We had an incident with some of our young nippers crossing the road where they had interactions with traffic and someone got hit. As a result, the board took the step to say we need to move across the highway,” he said.
The club has operated on the western side of the highway since 1957, but it has decided that it is no longer safe for children to cross such a busy road.
The club secured $1.5m in funding from the Queensland Government and $3.5m from the Australian Government to relocate and rebuild on the beach side.
“The approvals to move the club came through in September 2024 and we should have it finished by March next year,” Mr Jenkins said.
Despite significant progress, rising construction costs have left the club approximately $150,000 short of the funds needed to complete the new facility.
“We got pledged the money in 2019, so the actual budget hasn’t changed,” Mr Jenkins said.
“Our requirements haven’t changed, but how far we can stretch the money has,” he said. “We’re going to start a GoFundMe and put together a prospectus of all the things we’ve had to take out because of budgetary constraints.”
The new clubhouse will provide safer access for members and nippers, eliminating the need to cross the highway and making it easier to store and deploy lifesaving equipment.
“It’s amazing because of where it’s going to be – right on the water at Ellis Beach,” Mr Jenkins said.
“All the gear is going to be easily accessible from the clubhouse, direct to the beach for kids’ training and we can run nippers on Sunday mornings with minimal or no interaction with any traffic.”
The club currently has about 300 members and provides volunteer patrols from Easter through to the end of November, contributing more than 2500 volunteer hours annually.
There’s a massive amount of thanks that’s got to go to both the state government and the federal government for the funds that have been allocated to keep our kids safe, fit and healthy,” he said.
