The Disaster Resilient: Future Ready (DR:FR) Burnett Inland program has made significant inroads in strengthening the capacity of communities across the region to prepare for future disasters.

Delivered in partnership with Red Earth Community Foundation, and supported by funding from the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) Preparing Australian Communities – Local Stream and Minderoo Foundation, the three-year program supports development of an ongoing evidence base about what works to strengthen resilience in communities before, during and after disasters.

The model seeks to help remote, rural and regional communities to be better prepared for future disasters, and to support local people and organisations to develop and fund projects and initiatives that will improve disaster preparedness and community resilience.

Since early 2023, Red Earth staff have been working in the communities of Kalpowar, Dallarnil, Kumbia, Proston, Tansey and Cherbourg to identify resilience building initiatives.

All initiatives need to evidence broad community need through the concept development process, including endorsement by the DR:FR Internal Advisory Group (IAG). The IAG is comprised of community and sector-based representatives from the Burnett Inland (QLD). The views and feedback from the IAG are sought for all projects for a high level ‘concept endorsement’ to identify potential partnerships and to avoid duplication of local efforts. 

Applications for endorsed concepts have been invited from locally based not-for-profit organisations for:  

1. Local Community Initiatives that have been developed and agreed through the DR:FR workshops; and

2. Regional Initiatives that have been developed in collaboration with FRRR, Red Earth Community Foundation, the DR:FR Local Advisory Group, and other strategic partners. 

In total, there is c. $1.2M available to grant to support the initiatives that community groups identify.

As grants are awarded, we will add them to this story.

If you’d like to know more about any of the projects, contact Nancy Sposato.

Program guidelines can be found here.

FRRR has announced the latest funding from the returns on its Disaster Resilience & Recovery Fund.

A grant of $50,000 has been awarded to the recently established Northern Rivers Community Resilience Alliance (the Alliance). The funds will be auspiced through Resilient Lismore Inc.

The Alliance was established in March 2024 in response to an increasing recognition of the need for regional grassroots collaboration. Following the catastrophic floods and landslides in 2022, local community organisers have played a crucial role in disaster response, recovery, and adaptation. They have dedicated thousands of volunteer hours to developing sophisticated community-based systems, enhancing skills, building knowledge bases, and increasing organisational capacity at the local level. Despite minimal formal support, these organisers have amassed significant expertise in community-led disaster recovery and expressed a growing need for a peer support network, which the Alliance aims to provide.

The Alliance currently comprises of 60 full members who are predominately grassroots community-led resilience groups The Alliance actively connects and engages with a network of more than 150 associates, supporters and stakeholders across the Northern Rivers.

FRRR is among the first funders of this new regional Alliance. The grant funding will support the appointment of an Alliance Project Coordinator and cover essential operational expenses, including travel and coordination activities.

FRRR’s Disaster Resilience & Recovery Lead, Nina O’Brien, said FRRR recognises the value of community-led initiatives that enhance disaster resilience at a regional scale and is pleased to support NRCRA as it establishes its critical role.

“We know the strongest outcomes in disaster resilience happen when local community groups and organisations collaborate proactively, not only during and after disasters but importantly beforehand.

“The formation of the Alliance represents a significant advancement in disaster preparedness and resilience across the Northern Rivers region. Recent events such as Tropical Cyclone Alfred highlight the importance and urgency of coordinated, community-driven disaster preparedness initiatives,” Ms O’Brien said.

Donations to FRRR’s Disaster Resilience & Recovery Fund are tax deductible and those wishing to contribute can do so safely online.

Disaster Resilience & Recovery Fund | $22,500

Kalbarri in WA was severely impacted by Cyclone Seroja in April 2021, including losing the Kalbarri Community Centre, an important gathering place, especially for young people. With locals still focussed on their recovery, there had not been the opportunity – nor the funds – to rebuild it. Without a venue, the town also hadn’t come together to celebrate the efforts of those who had been working hard to support the community’s recovery.

The Association decided to rectify that and also start fundraising to rebuild their meeting place by hosting a ‘classy, fun’ inaugural annual Community Gala. Using funds from DRRF, Kalbarri Development Association Inc. secured a marquee, erected and cleaned it with the help of many volunteers and staged a sold-out event. The Gala strengthened connections, thanked volunteers who helped rebuild and celebrated the community’s resilience. They also raised more than $20,000 to go toward a new community meeting place.

In this context, community events following the Cyclone in Kalbarri go well beyond a simple social occasion. Instead they help to build vibrant and healthy community life through times of adversity, which pays dividends in deepened social connection and inclusion, both before and long after the event occurs.

“Our inaugural Community Gala was the talk of the town. Not just for the weeks after, but also in anticipation of it. Planning what to wear, makeup, hair dos and the like, created a sense of joy and anticipation. Businesses benefitted with the sale of clothes and accessories, hair dressing and make up appointments. … people who went said “this is just what we all needed!”
Lauren Sweetman

Report reaffirms need for disaster recovery funding for the medium to long-term

Five years on from the Black Summer Bushfires, FRRR has just released a report setting out how the $26 million donated to FRRR in the wake of the bushfires has been used so far to support the recovery and capacity-building of impacted communities. The report also shares some of the lessons learned during this process and makes recommendations for post-disaster funding.

Black Summer Bushfires, Five Years On (FRRR’s Five Years On Report) explains how, as at 30 June 2024, FRRR had distributed $19.3 million of the funds so generously donated to FRRR by business, philanthropy, governments and individuals to support 928 projects and activities in 240 impacted communities.

FRRR CEO, Natalie Egleton, said that while recovery is still ongoing in so many of the hundreds of fire-affected communities, the report confirms that the projects and activities the Foundation has funded have had positive impacts – people feel safer, better prepared, more connected and able to support one another.

“FRRR’s Five Years On Report reaffirms that local communities are best placed to determine their needs and define what will have the greatest effect towards recovery and building resilience against future disasters.

“It’s different in every place – from strengthening protective factors, such as a safe community meeting place or having a plan in case of a future disaster; to supporting children and families getting back to school and ready to learn; to building organisational capacity by enhancing systems and efficiencies; to upgrading halls and facilities so places are more self-sufficient; or providing dedicated resources, such as specialists in supporting people with disabilities to be prepared for future disaster events or paid staff to relieve volunteer fatigue.

“These are just some examples of the wide range of recovery projects and capacity-building activities that FRRR has funded. What it also highlights, is the need for flexible funding to meet the diverse and evolving needs of communities, especially when they are faced with multiple, consecutive disasters such as bushfires, followed by the pandemic, followed by flooding,” Ms Egleton explained.

The Black Summer Bushfires, Five Years On report also explains how $4.7 million of the donations have been invested in a perpetual fund, which is helping to ensure funding is available to support ongoing recovery efforts. The return from the fund has already seen a further $440,000 invested or set aside for recovery and preparedness projects, and will distribute grants annually in perpetuity. The remaining funds donated will be awarded in coming years to support ongoing recovery and preparedness efforts in the affected communities.

Ms Egleton said that this kind of sustainable investment to enable long-term recovery is one of the recommendations made in FRRR’s Five Years On Report.

“Having supported communities through disasters for more than 20 years, we know that recovery take time – in many cases, decades. While many provided immediate, critical support in response to the fires, FRRR knows that these fire-affected regions will need funding and support for the medium to long-term.

“For us, this means actively leaning in and being there, long after other services and funding sources have gone,” Ms Egleton said.

Read the report online, or download the PDF here. In addition to the report, you can also watch firsthand accounts from some of the communities that were impacted by the Black Summer Bushfires. The videos include interviews with local organisations explaining how funding from FRRR has played a part in their community’s recovery journey.

Through two In a Good Place (IAGP) grants, FRRR has helped support the establishment of the Castlemaine Safe Space – a peer-supported community drop-in space where locals can access mental health support and connect with others.

The first IAGP grant for $20,000 was awarded in 2021 to Castlemaine Community House to develop a pilot program, accessible to anyone with a desire to talk about mental health issues with a trained peer worker who has experienced mental health issues themselves. The funding supported the establishment and running of the space for a couple of sessions a week.

Despite several changes of venue, the pilot was very successful and proved the level of need in the community. The organisation – Castlemaine Safe Space – became an incorporated entity registered with the ACNC, and gained DGR1 status. It is now enjoying strong relationships with local health services.

Castlemaine Safe Space received a second IAGP grant of $13,000 in 2023 to help them strengthen and grow the service. The funding enabled them to employ a part-time project worker responsible for coordinating training for new volunteers, preparing shift rosters, arranging outreach and resourcing efforts, and developing new evaluation tools for the Safe Space. The grant was also used to purchase sensory equipment to support people experiencing heightened anxiety, and develop a communications plan to take advantage of local promotional opportunities so more locals knew about their service.

Castlemaine Safe Space proudly celebrated its second birthday in July 2024, and since becoming established, they’ve welcomed over 560 guests, trained nearly 40 peer volunteers and received more than 4,000 generous volunteer hours from community members.

They wrote that their experience with FRRR was excellent.

“We have found FRRR to be our most loyal supporter, with our initial grant allowing us to open our Safe Space two years ago, and this second grant allowing us to remain sustainable, provide training to our working group and peer volunteers, food and therapeutic resources for our guests and employ our Peer Volunteer Coordinator.

“We have found FRRR to be very easy to work with and undemanding in terms of restrictions and obligations to be met with our grants. We will always acknowledge FRRR as the organisation that helped us get up and running and provide ongoing support for our initiatives.

“FRRR has helped us provide a safe, calm and welcoming environment for local residents, reducing loneliness and isolation, providing a free, stigma-free place for those in emotional distress to go to, and subsequently reducing the factors that lead to suicidal thoughts and acts.

“Thank you FRRR for supporting us in our journey from the beginning up to now, when we have just secured a semi-permanent rental property allowing us to reduce the demands on our peer volunteers and feel more secure in the near future.”

With support from our long-time partner, The Sally Foundation, FRRR awarded $12,000 through three grants to not-for-profit community organisations in the Mildura region. These grants are helping bring to life ideas generated during the Mildura Takeover Summit.

The FRRR ABC Takeover Youth Catalyst Grants empower communities to act on innovative ideas proposed by local youth at a leadership summit. Over the course of a week, up to 36 young people collaborate to explore the issues that matter to them and devise creative solutions. Local not-for-profits are then invited to apply for funding to work alongside these young idea-makers, bringing their concepts to life.

These grants provide a pathway for youth-led ideas to be piloted in their communities, creating opportunities for young people to connect with local organisations and have their voices heard on issues important to them.

Thallon State School P&C is dedicated to supporting the local school, and in turn the vibrancy and sustainability of their small town.

After severe drought, a mouse plague and then COVID, student numbers were dwindling, so the P&C decided to upgrade the school playground, hoping to encourage new families to join. But first they needed to raise some funds. This led to the annual Thallon Team Truck Pull event. In its first year alone, the event drew 300+ attendees and raised more than $17,000 for the school playground project.

To make the event even more comfortable for those attending the Truck Pull – and to provide vital sun protection to students – the Thallon State School P&C Association received an $8,577 Small & Vital Strengthening Rural Communities grant, funded by Hand Heart Pocket – The Charity of Freemasons Queensland, to buy new shade structures. They are designed to be set-up with ease (just 60 seconds) and are 100% waterproof and UV protected, ensuring the safety and comfort of students and the wider community. The covers are also branded, showcasing the Thallon State School logo, which creates a sense of identity, wellbeing and place for its users.  

The structures are also now available to the whole community for a variety of purposes, including swimming days, athletic carnivals and community events such as ANZAC day and Christmas in the Park. To the Thallon community’s delight, the structures arrived before ANZAC Day, ensuring that they could be used for both the in-school and community service.

P&C representative Janna Spierenburg said, “This is one way that the school can offer support back to the community, as a thank you for their continued support.”

A clever project led by Yorke and Northern Local Health Network Incorporated (YNLHN) has improved health and wellbeing outcomes for Aboriginal people living in rural and remote regions in South Australia. The campaign involved offering a free shirt, featuring First Nations art, to connect community members to a vital health check program.

YNLHN recognises that an Aboriginal-specific health service is crucial for the delivery of culturally appropriate care. It encourages community members to interact with clinical staff in a comfortable environment, provides valuable opportunities for Aboriginal health professionals to practice their clinical skills and helps to give Aboriginal people autonomy over their health.

The 715 Aboriginal Health Checks are an opportunity for early detection and prevention of a range of health issues through treatment, education and support. YNLHN data showed that only 21.17% of their regular clients were up to date with their 715 checks. Incentives have been proven to increase the number of Aboriginal people seeking these assessments, which aid in closing the gap in health inequalities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.

The YNLHN Aboriginal Health Team was conscious of engaging the beneficiaries in every step of the project. They called for expressions of interest from community members to develop artwork that focussed on place, community, health and wellbeing. This was an opportunity for local artists to showcase their abilities and connect to culture through artwork and storytelling. The successful submission received overwhelming support from community voters and was used for the final shirt design.

The slogan was the only point of contention. Originally it was ‘Stay alive, have your 715’. However, the artist workshopped it with her high school art class to find a culturally relevant alternative. They chose ‘715 Deadly Unna’ which, roughly translated, reads ‘having your 715 is good yes?’ This meant that the project’s reach extended to young people in high school, a notoriously difficult age group to engage with.

A $10,000 Strengthening Rural Communities grant funded the printing of the shirts, which was executed by Aboriginal-owned and operated printing company We Create Print Deliver.

The shirts were officially launched at a health and cultural event, Tarpari Wellbeing Day in Port Pirie in April 2024. This was fantastic exposure for the project, with 66 agencies and more than 3,000 community members in attendance.

The project has been a huge success: there has been a significant uptake in MBS 715 health checks since its launch. The Aboriginal Health Team was even required to develop a new schedule to manage the influx, and additional funding has been sourced for a further 250 polo shirts to accommodate their popularity. In addition, the artist has had an increase of commissioned artwork; discussions have opened between healthcare professionals and the Aboriginal community; and the wider community is more open to discussing the discrepancies in health outcomes for Aboriginal people.

YNLHN representative Kit Prior said, “We are so proud of this project and what it has achieved. People from all walks of life love these shirts and we have had numerous requests to purchase them.”

Health outcomes in the Yorke and Northern region have improved considerably because of this project, a fantastic example of how targeted small grants can have a profound impact.

The Buloke region in Victoria has endured years of spirit-crushing events – from drought to COVID restrictions and flooding rains – and the Buloke Women’s Network has been crucial to keeping spirits up through it all.

The need to come together to recover from isolation and respond to the challenges wrought by these events is how the Celebrating the Women of the Buloke Shire project started. Women came together regularly from across the shire to hear inspiring local speakers at events such as Champagne at Sunset at Lake Tyrell, and a dinner prepared by a local small business at the beautiful Watchem Church.

A Tackling Tough Times Together grant covered catering, venue expenses, advertising and transport. “I could see the impacts of drought, floods, climate change, rising farm costs and declining prices. And there was nothing to support women in the area,” co-founder Ellen White says.

“They wanted to meet other people from other places and connect with them and hear what was happening for them, and if they had the solutions to some of the problems that they had, and just to share their stories.”

Co-founder Julie Slater says their initial aim was enabling social opportunities for women, but in retrospect she realises how pivotal these gatherings were in helping the entire district survive.

“One of the things that we found really quickly was that what women were looking for was for social connection. Women wanted to be able to stop and take that breath and really sort of say, yep, I’m busy. I have a lot going on, but at the end of the day, I need to fill my own cup if I’m going to be there and fill the rest of my family’s, the rest of my workplace, the rest of my community’s cup.”

FRRR’s CEO, Natalie Egleton, recently spoke at the Social Impact in the Regions Conference. Before participating in a panel discussion that was focussed on addressing challenges in remote, rural and regional Australia, Natalie delivered a brief presentation. The following are her speech notes.

All too often, regional communities are only visible to the rest of the country and to policymakers through a lens of crisis, disadvantage, or as somewhere from which resources needed by others can be extracted.

From the hundreds of community grants and conversations we have at FRRR, we know that is not the narrative regional communities want to focus on. The challenges are definitely there; regional communities live them every day. But what would happen if we flipped the narrative to one where regions are understood, invested in and valued for their intrinsic value – their innovation, intelligence, creativity and contribution to their own and the nation’s wellbeing and economies?

The possibilities are remarkable when we do this. I’m going to share three case studies of communities and organisations that FRRR has partnered with over multiple years as they navigated these very questions. I’m not telling their story on their behalf but sharing what we noticed throughout our funding partnerships with them. They stand out but are by no means the only such organisations and communities. And a hint – there are some common themes about the different types and roles of backbone organisations; the capacity for challenges to catalyse innovation; and why place-based change takes time – sometimes generations.

Red Ridge Interior Queensland

Red Ridge Interior is in Blackall – almost the centre of Queensland. They are an arts organisation at their heart and evolved into so much more during the drought that crippled much of western Queensland in the mid 2000’s until very recently. Their model is one of collaboration that supports outcomes like intergenerational connection, First Nations economic self-determination, women’s health and wellbeing, and leadership development.

The first grant we awarded was just $2,500 to help them build a better business model. We have since supported many of their initiatives. Over the years, as they’ve grown in confidence – and people have built confidence in them –they’ve blown it out of the park.

Red Ridge described themselves as an auspice for local projects – but I would argue that they have played a backbone role for western Queensland.

In remote communities like Blackall, there are fewer services, small, dispersed populations, and narrow economies. They need organisations that can play integrated and multifaceted roles across population groups, industries and join dots in policy and funding systems to make them work for their local context.

One of their activities is the now annual Channel Country Ladies Day – an event with the tagline ‘inspiration in isolation’. It brings together women from across the channel country, right down into Birdsville and further north to Longreach and surrounds.

It was an idea born during the drought, when the load that women were carrying – caring for family, finding ways to generate off-farm income, managing the farm business – was noticed, alongside the fact that they weren’t caring for themselves. This is not any ordinary event; it brings together hundreds of women for reprieve, wellbeing support, fun and skill development. It also builds economic opportunity by creating space for micro-enterprises, and enterprise development. It’s a space for hard conversations and care for people doing hard work.

As the drought’s impacts deepened, Red Ridge saw an opportunity to play a role in ‘finding beauty in the drought’ and created the Dress the Central West event. They partnered with Central West Hospital and Health Service (CWHHS) and Central West Aboriginal Corporation (CWAC) to create the fashion parade of the year, Dress the Central West. Teaming with Fashion designer Claudia Williams from Llani Creative, each outfit represented the history and traditions of the four communities involved in the project – Winton, Blackall, Longreach and Barcaldine.

The event tapped into layers of talent in the community and gave people who were often excluded from opportunities a platform to shine. With support from a fashion designer, communities designed several outfits that best represented their towns, stories and culture in the adversity of drought, using recycled or found material.

The work that Red Ridge and the communities of the Central West faced – and still face – include big challenges, but they have found ways to create energy from within communities to co-create new stories and futures.

Red Earth Community Foundation

Red Earth Community Foundation is one of about 40 place-based philanthropic foundations in Australia – a network that is growing and evolving dynamic community-owned models of generating and redistributing capital in their local communities. Red Earth covers the North and South Burnett and Cherbourg communities in Queensland.

FRRR has partnered with Red Earth since it was a seed of an idea, through many grants and strategic partnerships. It’s a leading model of community mobilisation and transformation from the ground up.

Like many innovations, a crisis was the catalyst for the formation of Red Earth Community Foundation, following a major flood event in 2014. Conversations among a few key people were about what the Burnett needed in 100 years’ time – it was a different vision and one that held a new narrative about its challenges. This was in a context of the Burnett describing the region as the hole in the doughnut – the region that had high needs and one of the highest rates of socio-economic disadvantage in the country. They saw investment flowing everywhere but the Burnett Inland.

Funding to support flood recovery occurred around the same time as funding to support setting up good governance for the emerging Foundation. The latter involved much consultation and education about what a community foundation structure might bring to the Burnett.

There was a space to shift – they could continue blaming and being victims of poor systems, or they could mobilise and create something else. So, they set out on a different path to most community foundations – instead of starting with money, they started with people and developed a community leadership program. More than 200 people have now graduated from the program and are activating opportunities across the region.

In just a decade, Red Earth has become a vital backbone for the region – they are a trusted convenor of community voice and action. Beyond the leadership program, they are facilitating major drought resilience and disaster preparedness initiatives, and brokering opportunities for community benefit from renewable energy projects.

FRRR and Red Earth are currently partnering on the Disaster Resilient: Future Ready program, which is supporting community co-design of disaster resilience across the small towns in the Burnett Inland region. The teams were together at the recent AIDR conference to showcase the work and learnings.

Red Earth’s is a story of people power and a collective decision to adopt an opportunity mindset.

Toolangi

The final example is not of a single organisation but rather a small community – population just 335 – in an area affected by Black Saturday bushfires in 2009; it’s about an hour and a half north east of Melbourne.

In this tiny village, the Community House is the hub and provides a central point of connection and information. It is mostly volunteer run, with a tiny amount of funding for operations and programming. When the fires impacted the town, the Community House was the central organisation for recovery efforts. They had to step up and play a far more complex role in rebuilding the town and people’s lives.

The Community House brought together the ideas and needs of the town and went about gradually planning and actioning – with small amounts of funding as they went. Of course they couldn’t do it all at once. And as such a small town and organisation, nor could they accept too much support all at once. So, FRRR worked alongside them, supporting the community when they were ready and as needs evolved and people were able to do some of the actual implementation.

The focus was on long-term recovery, regeneration, over weeks and months. Support was given in different places, at different times. The support via the Community House similarly took different forms, and as needs evolved, investment went with them. Some of the projects supported by FRRR included strategic thinking about how to approach recovery; a focus on wellbeing; the need to create a place where health and fitness – physical and emotional wellbeing – could support social wellbeing across different groups – students; women; men etc.

The weekly community fitness program had a huge impact on the community as they recovered and found a ‘new normal’ after the fires. People were at risk of becoming isolated and mental health was a growing issue. In a largely ageing community, physical wellbeing was the way in to addressing mental wellbeing. An evaluation of this program found significant reduction in risk factors and increases in wellbeing at a population level. In fact, the program is still running.

They also hosted others including the men’s shed and the community garden – and reactivated spaces in town that could support connection, healing and regeneration. While there were many people involved, one person in particular was, and still is, the glue for this town – she carefully, kindly, and strategically worked with the community to reimagine spaces and opportunities. She did it knowing that they would never attract the big money or media headlines and so worked smartly too – with locally led sustainability as the goal.

That’s often the reality for those working in remote, rural and regional communities – the challenges are there and it’s up to those of us living and working there to find our unique assets and strengths.

These three examples showcase what’s possible if we flip the narrative and invest in communities, especially in backbone organisations that can take carriage of maintaining focus for the long game. They come in different shapes and sizes and, when built from and by community, are vital parts of community infrastructure. The other lesson I’d share, both from my work at FRRR but also as the resident of a small rural community, is to work on the assumption that the money may never come – hard as that is, it can liberate new thinking and opportunity. I hope that these anecdotes encourage you to reconsider your view of remote, rural and regional Australia. It’s not all doom and gloom – even when times are tough. Imagine what might be possible if regions are truly understood, invested in and valued for their innovation, intelligence, creativity and the contribution they make to our nation’s wellbeing and prosperity.