Community surveillance key to flushing out toilet troublemakers

But like the proverbial pub with no beer, long lamented across outback Australia, a city without loos is – frankly – not much of a city at all.

That's why Townsville City Council's dedicated teams steadfastly service these essential community assets, conducting thousands of hygiene, security and property checks each month and performing around 1,200 individual cleans.

It is no small task, given the literal revolving-door nature of the public toilet – for example, the restrooms located along The Strand and at Riverway notched up more than 500,000 visitors in 2025 alone.

Despite all this, and their generally nondescript nature, the city's sanitary stops – vital for individual comfort and community cleanliness – are increasingly the target of arsonists, vandals, and individuals who otherwise desire to demonstrate destruction against dunnies.

In response, Townsville Mayor Nick Dametto has said enough is enough.

In 2025 alone, Council spent more than $350,000 repairing and maintaining public toilets, with vandalism accounting for a significant portion of that cost.

Townsville Mayor Nick Dametto

Councillor Dametto said vandalism of public toilets was an ongoing issue across the city and one that placed a significant financial burden on ratepayers each year.

"It is a ridiculous phenomenon, but we are seeing too many incidents of fire damage, graffiti, and littering at Council-owned rest rooms, and these often lead to sudden shutdowns of these sites without notice and sometimes for long periods of time," Cr Dametto said.

"Our network of public rest rooms are strategically placed to ensure maximum convenience to the residents of, and visitors to, our beautiful city.

"Having them forced offline due to behaviour that demonstrates a total disregard for others is extremely disappointing, and it needs to be called out.

"In 2025 alone, Council spent more than $350,000 repairing and maintaining public toilets, with vandalism accounting for a significant portion of that cost.

"That's money that I would much rather see invested in building more playgrounds or adding more shade to our parks and open spaces for families to enjoy."

Cr Dametto said he was calling on the community to help flush out those who pose a liability to the city's latrines.

"We are hoping to reduce this antisocial, and frankly stupid, behaviour by asking sensible people in the community to report criminal conduct to the police and vandalism to Council so we can act on it," he said.

Residents can report vandalism or concerns about public toilets, or any Council-owned asset, via the Snap, Send Solve app or by phoning 13 48 10.