Street volunteers needed

By Jo Kennett

THE POTTSVILLE Community-led Resilience Team (CRT) is seeking volunteers in different streets to help lead the town’s future emergency responses, as part of the 2022 flood response.

Pottsville, like many communities, was badly impacted by the February 2022 flood.

After the flood, Together Pottsville helped create the Pottsville CRT to help residents prepare for disasters and to provide critical guidance and communication to residents before, during and after disasters.

Together Pottsville now needs trusty volunteers/leaders from residential streets across Koala Beach, Pottsville Waters, Seabreeze, Pottsville village, Black Rocks and Pottsville Beach to become ‘street coordinators’ in the newly-formed Pottsville CRT.

The street coordinator is a crucial element in the CRT and will play a key role in emergencies.

He or she will know their neighbours and street community well and can check in on residents before, during and after a disaster to see if they need any help.

This is particularly helpful for vulnerable people who may find it difficult to evacuate.

The street coordinator will only pass on information from trusted sources such as the SES or RFS, and can feed any help required back to the agencies via the CRT as well.

A training session for all interested street co- ordinators will be held by the Pottsville CRT on Thursday, February 9, at 6pm at the SES training room (behind the RFS on Centennial Drive, Pottsville) to give street coordinators all they need to get started.

The 1.5 hour-long session will provide more information on the street coordinator role, including how to get neighbours on board, how to manage contact details, and the communication plan in an emergency.

Together Pottsville hopes for a good turnout of local street leaders/volunteers.

Over the next few months the Pottsville CRT will also be working on providing a welcome pack for new residents to explain the natural risks of living in the community, including the provision of helpful links should an emergency event occur.

Together Pottsville is a community group established in 2021, focusing on sustainability and disaster resilience.

To date they have created a website with a local directory (www.togetherpottsville.org), implemented a coffee cup recycling project (with St Ambrose Primary School), and held a number of community catch-up events and rubbish clean ups.

To register your attendance at the upcoming street coordinator training night or to find out more, please email Mel, Pottsville CRT coordinator, at pottsvillecrt@gmail.com