Tairawhiti Resilience Plan
What is resilience? · Resilience is not tangible – can’t reach out and touch it · It involves an attitude shift by the community · Resilience definition for this project - “the ability to anticipate and resist the effects of a disruptive event, minimise adverse impacts, respond effectively, maintain or recover functionality, and adapt in a way that allows for learning and thriving”
Four Rs of emergency management · Reduction of risk Identifying risks out in the community that can be reduced eg raising the Waipaoa River flood control stop banks · Readiness The things we do before an event happens to prepare eg going to schools and businesses to help them with their plans and getting ready and training · Response Having an effective and reliable reaction to the impacts of an event eg setting up the Emergency Coordination Centre · Recovery Emergency element is over and move back into the longer time actions to get back to a stable place
Tairawhiti Resilience Plan · The Resilience Plan will take both the potential negative effects from climate change and natural hazards into account · Looks across all Four Rs of emergency management · Takes a proactive approach not waiting to respond to “the big event” · Involves hardening and strengthening key aspects eg infrastructure for our community · Means getting our training and resources geared up including the right people · We will be taking lessons learned from emergency situations locally, nationally and internationally
Discussion · Wellbeing is a catchword going around – the wellbeing of our community is important · The idea is to get from Response to Recovery as quickly as possible · The more time spent planning (risk reduction/readiness) reduces the time to get to recovery · Can only do this if the people and the things that they need to be safe (infrastructure, services etc) are restored · Need to work together as a team across the region to ensure survival · It will involve looking at different options in worst-case scenarios · The Hikurangi Response scenario is our worst-case scenario and involves large scale devastation of the East Coast of NZ – this is what we are planning for · Tsunami is a given – it’s not a matter of if but when – but we have completed tsunami inundation zones modelling and there is some work to do to get this circulated – need to be responsible with providing the information to the public · Council will talk to stakeholders with responsibilities about what actions can be taken eg electricity providers etc and how to harden their assets · Council will also be talking with schools about readiness · The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war · Council wants TCV input into the process as advocates for and representatives of vulnerable populations
Please tell us … · Related to wide-scale hazards and risks (such as tsunami, terrorist attack, pandemic, etc), what are the key vulnerabilities you see in our community? · Conversely, what are our key strengths that can help us come through? · What information do you have that you could share with us around the risks and hazards you are aware of and how your organisation is planning to deal with them? · How should we best support vulnerable populations in an emergency situation?
You can tell us by email to Wiremu.tamati@gdc.govt.nz or yvette@gdc.govt.nz or you can phone us on 06 867 2049
Notes kindly provided by Yvette Kinsella, Principal Officer - Integrated Strategy, Gisborne District Council www.gdc.govt.nz