TWEED Shire councillors have voted to favour people over koalas after they were told a new Community Health Centre at Pottsville would block a koala corridor.

Councillors voted at Tuesday night's council meeting to approve the health centre after being warned if they did not the matter would instead go to the Joint Regional Planning Panel.

They were told the delay was likely to mean funding for the centre would be lost.

But the move shocked Greens Party councillor Katie Milne who said it involved the loss of koala food trees in a koala corridor and came in the wake of a warning from a prominent koala expert that "every single koala food tree" was "fundamentally important".

"I don't want to see a situation where the health of the community is in conflict with the health of the koalas but that is what we are facing," she added before unsuccessfully calling for the matter to be deferred.

Council staff said the North Coast Area Health Service had lodged a development application for the $2.5million health centre in Elizabeth St, Pottsville.

The centre would include 16 consulting rooms and offices, a variety of ancillary offices, storage and reception areas and 42 car-parking spaces.

It would be next door to the council-owned Pottsville Neighbourhood Centre.

Cr van Lieshout said people should come first.

"We are here to provide services to our ratepayers. When it comes down to the two I have to stand up for people first as much as I would like to stand up for the koalas," she said.

Council general manager Mike Rayner said "the local member (National Party MP for Tweed Geoff Provest) had called him about the issue and led him to understand if approval was not given "this project s in danger of going south".