http://morwellnh.org.au/morwell-neighbourhood-house-thick-anhlc-newsletter/
Morwell Neighbourhood House – In the thick of it is a great article about the process of going through the Hazelwood coal mine fire. You can read the whole ANHLC Newsletter April 2014 here. Below is a copy of the article by ANHLC. Morwell Neighbourhood House would like to Thank ANHLC for the kind gesture of donating funds raised at the 2014 conference dinner.
Morwell Neighbourhood House – In the thick of it
The Hazelwood Mine fires started in early February 2014 and raged out of control for nearly four weeks. Communities in and around Morwell lived through weeks under a thick blanket of smoke and ash. Coordinator Tracie Lund and her team at Morwell Neighbourhood House (MNH), as good community development workers, quickly recognised that the fires were having a widespread impact on the entire Morwell community.
They immediately got down to work to supporttheir community through the crisis and actively plan for recovery once the worst of the emergency was over. ‘The first thing we did was close the House and spent the morning calling residents in our database to check on them.’ said Tracie. To the credit of the staff and volunteers at MNH, the house only closed a few times during the worst of the fires. The rest of the time it was kept open to provide a place for people to access information and resources related to the fires.
MNH’s capacity to meet the needs of their community during such a difficult time was largely built on earlier work in forming networks and relationships with emergency services, key community organisations and community members.
Power of good Communications
MNH used their existing communication channels including their own participant database, social media and created new ones to keep everyone informed. They organised volunteers to letterbox their area and got people to make‘phone trees’ to promote health warnings and give information about available resources.
Building on the connections formed in organising the family day, Morwell NH was able to respond to a call for help from the CFA who needed to communicate urgently with the community. Through the House the CFA tapped into the NH network to get the information out far and wide. ‘Our strong emergency service networks insured we were first on the ground to organise public information session.’ said Tracie Lund.
The feedback from this meeting and from the community in general made it clear that communication and information were the keys to working through the fires crisis.
Morwell NH set up a series of weekly information sessions for local people to keep everyone informed ‘We took on the weekly information session to give the community a voice as well as a platform to get information about this crisis to the community in a way they could understand. It was a more personalised approach and we were able to tap into a number of resources and people to ensure we had the best information we could for our community’.
Benefits of relationship building
Thanks to previous work with emergency service and welfare orgs MNH was quickly identified as an effective place to engage with the community. This meant emergency service workers could easily provide information, and distribute practical resources such as face masks, door seals and air purifiers. The CFA having heard about the MNH lawn mower bank, established vacuum cleaner bank, making fine particle vacuum cleaners freely available on loan to residents to assist in cleaning up ash residue. The vacuum cleaner bank was based at the House and at a number of other venues throughout the town.
Importance of a safe space to debrief
MNH along with Emergency Services and welfare organisations also played a vital role in providing a forum for the community to debrief.
There was a lot of fear about health impacts and anger about apparent inaction or slow response from local and state government.
Until the Ambulance Victoria Health Assessment Centre was established, Morwell NH fielded much of the initial wave of community frustration and anger. They provided a safe place to debrief and were able to document community fears and concerns. This was all fed back to local government, CFA Community Engagement Officers and DHS. They corrected misinformation where possible but tried to alert local and state government about the apparent gaps in community support and resources. ‘We did our best to defend the actions or perceived inactions of council but the swell of dissatisfaction was far greater than the voice we had. We continued to feed up to council level what we were hearing/seeing etc. on the ground. We knew that the council was working very hard. The workers on the ground are suffering but still coming in each day to do what they can. Lots of measures are put in place to support the community but they are missing the mark in communicating this. They are missing the need from the community for practical help.’
Recovery and Community Advocacy
MNH’s approach clearly gained the trust of the community and the decision makers.
Tracie reported that ‘MNHLC is officially invited to the response & recovery advisory board. This group will lead the recovery process for Morwell. It is vital we are at this table. We can provide a very unique insight to the community, we have a number of services that can be used to engage the community and we have from day one promoted support and unity within our community.’
On a more personal level MNH also hosted a pamper and de-stressing day for affected community members. The day offered free wellbeing and pampering treats including massage,
meditation and more for people affected by the fires and smoke plaguing their community.
MNH contributed to coordinating the community call for an independent inquiry into the causes and possible health impacts of the fires. They established a successful online petition that eventually attracted over 13,000 signatures.
The Hazelwood inquiry opened the doors and called for public submissions at the end of March. Headed by Black Saturday royal commissioner Justice Bernard Teague, the inquiry will investigate government regulation of the Hazelwood mine, the emergency response, the role of mine operator GDF Suez and the adequacy of health information passed on to Morwell residents.
Morwell NH is now busy encouraging and supporting its community to participate in the inquiry.
The Morwell story is another example of the vital role that Neighbourhood Houses can play in supporting their communities through disaster and recovery. The Neighbourhood Houses approach builds community resilience and strengthens community connections.
Morwell NH is presenting on their community resilience building story at the conference in May. See draft program in this newsletter and on ANHLC website at www.anhlc.asn.au/whats-on/conference
The ANHLC Board has agreed to donate funds raised at a silent auction at the 2014 Conference dinner to the Morwell NH.
#GippsNews, #MorwellNH
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