Fraser Coast properties

Butchulla is the language spoken in the Fraser Coast region and on K'gari. Other forms of the name are Batjala, Badtjala, Badjela and Badjala. The language region takes in country inside the Fraser Coast Regional Council's boundaries. Maryborough and Hervey Bay sit within it, and it extends south towards Noosa and northwest as far as Howard.

Maryborough's municipal borough was proclaimed on 10 March 1861, and it was governed under the Municipalities Act 1858, which had come down from New South Wales when Queensland separated in 1859. The borough was Queensland's sixth municipal government, and Henry Palmer was its first Mayor.

Divisional boards followed. The Antigua and Burrum Divisions came into being on 11 November 1879, under the Divisional Boards Act 1879, covering the country around what is now Hervey Bay. The Granville Division was set up on 15 September 1883 for the district around Maryborough. Howard Division broke away from the Isis Division in 1900.

The Local Authorities Act 1902 turned the four divisions into shires on 31 March 1903, and Maryborough into a Town. Maryborough gained City status on 7 January 1905, and a Town Hall at Kent and Adelaide Streets became the City's administrative centre. Degilbo Shire, renamed Biggenden later, broke away from Burrum on 3 June 1905, and Burrum took the name Pialba on 23 December 1905.

On 17 February 1917 the shires of Granville, Antigua and Pialba were dissolved. The land of the three shires was split between a newly made Burrum Shire and Woocoo Shire, gazetted three years before. By the 1920s the Hervey Bay area grew quickly, helped by continuing growth in industries that included sugar cane and citrus, and by investment in transport. In the 1950s and 1960s the population grew, development increased, and the towns along the coast gradually joined into a single urban area.

Burrum Shire was renamed Hervey Bay Shire on 20 December 1975, with the change taking effect at the local government elections of 27 March 1976. The coastal region drew the new focus: Maryborough City annexed 1,086.4 square kilometres where an estimated 1,119 people lived, and Woocoo Shire annexed 1,269.0 square kilometres with an estimated 2,629 residents.

Hervey Bay Shire gained Town status in September 1977, and it became a City on 18 February 1984. On 15 March 2008, Hervey Bay City merged with Maryborough City, Woocoo Shire and the northern part of Tiaro, creating the Fraser Coast Region; the Queensland parliament had passed the legislation behind the change on 10 August 2007. In November 2018, the Deputy Prime Minister, the federal member for Hinkler and the Fraser Coast mayor announced that the regional council would join a regional deal with the Australian Government, for infrastructure.

Fraser Coast sits in Queensland's Wide Bay-Burnett region, about 250 kilometres north of Brisbane. Hervey Bay and Maryborough are its twin cities, and K'gari, once called Fraser Island, lies within it. The region was formed in 2008 by merging the two cities with the Woocoo Shire and most of Tiaro Shire.

In 2021 the Fraser Coast council area had 111,032 residents, with a median age of 51. The population was estimated at 117,940 in 2023.