- Published on
By Helen Zervopoulos
THE recent community recovery meetings were an opportunity for council, emergency services and AusNet to understand how the devastating storm on February 13 affected the community in order to improve strategies to deal with natural disasters in the future.
The meeting at the Grantville hall was extremely well attended by both residents and emergency service representatives, including the SES, CFA, Police, Ambulance and allied emergency service personnel, as well as AusNet.
Western Port councillor Geoff Ellis introduced the agenda and praised the community and emergency response teams on the way everyone had worked together to find ways of community support and give help to those in need.
THE recent community recovery meetings were an opportunity for council, emergency services and AusNet to understand how the devastating storm on February 13 affected the community in order to improve strategies to deal with natural disasters in the future.
The meeting at the Grantville hall was extremely well attended by both residents and emergency service representatives, including the SES, CFA, Police, Ambulance and allied emergency service personnel, as well as AusNet.
Western Port councillor Geoff Ellis introduced the agenda and praised the community and emergency response teams on the way everyone had worked together to find ways of community support and give help to those in need.
The positive vibe he was attempting to foster quickly turned into blame and finger pointing once the meeting was given over to the attendees. It became clear that there was a lot of anger in the room and quite a few people were there to blame AusNet and the council for not doing more to assist those who were most affected, including businesses and those who went for more than three days without power.
I must say I don’t have much sympathy for people who go to meetings to play the blame game and draw attention to themselves and their personal grievances. Those who expect council and other authorities to jump to it, fix their problems and ease the suffering and inconveniences they experience due to a natural disaster have a very narrow perspective on the bigger picture.
It is obvious that natural disasters including fires, storms and floods will become more frequent as global warming continues to affect climate change throughout the world.
Yes there will be devastation, suffering and inconvenience. As individuals we need to become more resilient and be better prepared for these events.
Emergency services do their best to clear debris, offer medical assistance and community support. AusNet has taken on the feedback regarding a warning system and back up support to minimise the telecommunications fallout in future freak events.
The purpose of the community recovery meetings was to get community feedback in order to be better prepared with emergency response solutions in the future. I congratulate council staff, officers and councillors for caring and taking the time to organise these meetings. I thank all the emergency service personnel who dedicated their time in doing such a wonderful job in cleaning up the devastation and giving support wherever they could.
I am grateful that we have these support services and I count myself lucky to live in such a caring and civil minded community.
I must say I don’t have much sympathy for people who go to meetings to play the blame game and draw attention to themselves and their personal grievances. Those who expect council and other authorities to jump to it, fix their problems and ease the suffering and inconveniences they experience due to a natural disaster have a very narrow perspective on the bigger picture.
It is obvious that natural disasters including fires, storms and floods will become more frequent as global warming continues to affect climate change throughout the world.
Yes there will be devastation, suffering and inconvenience. As individuals we need to become more resilient and be better prepared for these events.
Emergency services do their best to clear debris, offer medical assistance and community support. AusNet has taken on the feedback regarding a warning system and back up support to minimise the telecommunications fallout in future freak events.
The purpose of the community recovery meetings was to get community feedback in order to be better prepared with emergency response solutions in the future. I congratulate council staff, officers and councillors for caring and taking the time to organise these meetings. I thank all the emergency service personnel who dedicated their time in doing such a wonderful job in cleaning up the devastation and giving support wherever they could.
I am grateful that we have these support services and I count myself lucky to live in such a caring and civil minded community.
We could call it a freak event but we know it’s no longer that because it’s happening so often somewhere in the world. Just look at the cyclone that ripped through New Zealand’s north island this time last year.
But I’m also overwhelmed with gratitude for the people who pulled together to support one another, to the SES volunteers who were out all night clearing roads, to the council workers who are still out clearing up the debris.
As Helen says, we are incredibly lucky to live in a civil minded community.
Our governments have us on a trajectory for climate breakdown, which means more storms like this. I think we need to engage in community activism to do to t against fossil fuels, and other contributors to this crisis. Hopefully this storm will inspire more People to get involved in the climate movement.
but there are also more and more people needing a helping hand on a daily basis.
I think care and compassion for everyone is imperative. It's in our DNA around here, along with resilience and neighbourly concern, and they are strengths we can build on.
Reach out.
We need to
Neighbours are fabulous and I managed to get creative with my cooking on a small camp stove since I rely totally on Electricity as we all do up here.
A good lesson for all of us to realise that we can get by in difficult times.
Many thanks to all our local services who worked day and night to reconnect us