AESM Vol 22 Edition 1 2021

had dwindled to just 133 people with a<br />

median age of 61.<br />

The town relies on agriculture and<br />

animal husbandry, but faces myriad<br />

challenges, including:<br />

• deteriorating Federation-era<br />

buildings, such as churches and<br />

community halls, with about 30%<br />

of houses unoccupied<br />

• poor transport infrastructure,<br />

including crumbling roads, only<br />

one bus stop, a bus that goes<br />

once a week to Bendigo<br />

• declining economic activity, with<br />

just one hotel, one post office and<br />

little to attract visitors<br />

• growing risk from storms,<br />

droughts and bushfires<br />

• a vulnerable population, with<br />

approximately 60-70% people<br />

living from pension to pension<br />

• limited access to health care<br />

facilities<br />

• insecure power and water<br />

infrastructure.<br />

The town is at risk of disappearing.<br />

Its people face real danger when fire,<br />

heatwaves or other natural hazards<br />

strike and there’s precious little<br />

disposable income to spend on futureproofing<br />

homes.<br />

The trajectory for Tarnagulla is not<br />

unusual in Victoria. Determined<br />

to save it from being engulfed by<br />

climate-change related disasters,<br />

the community applied for and got a<br />

grant from the Victorian Department<br />

of Environment, Land, Water and<br />

Planning, through their Virtual Centre<br />

for Climate Change Innovation.<br />

They used part of the money to<br />

engage one of the authors (Mittul<br />

Vahanvati), to co-produce a RAP for<br />

and by Tarnagulla community.<br />

Increasingly frequent and harsher<br />

heatwaves, bushfires and droughts<br />

We held eight workshops over two<br />

years in Tarnagulla, with project<br />

leaders from the local community<br />

meeting me (Mittul Vahanvati) monthly.<br />

Establishing mutual trust and a sense<br />

of collaborative design was crucial; the<br />

process doesn’t work when an outsider<br />

parachutes in and starts telling locals<br />

what to do.<br />

We identified the town’s existing<br />

strengths (outlined in the table below).<br />

We also talked about how climate<br />

change-related disasters — such as<br />

increasingly frequent and harsher<br />

heatwaves, bushfires and droughts —<br />

were causing problems locally such as<br />

• power outages becoming longer<br />

and more frequent<br />

• the soaring cost of keeping the<br />

house cool<br />

• concerns the dam might burst in<br />

a flood<br />

• people going without water for<br />

five days in previous disasters<br />

and being forced to buy water to<br />

survive.<br />

The resulting RAP identified five main<br />

goals. These can be seen in the table<br />

on the following page.<br />

Local councillors, and representatives<br />

from the emergency management<br />

sector and the health sector got<br />

together to test out the RAP, its<br />

feasibility and whether it would help<br />

reduce loss and devastation of town<br />

during hazards.<br />

It became clear a complete emergency<br />

evacuation plan would require<br />

the town having a safer shelter,<br />

improving key roads used to flee the<br />

town and ensuring comprehensive<br />

communication systems to help<br />

vulnerable people (such as older<br />

people, children or single people)<br />

during a disaster.<br />

The town also identified the need for<br />

www.ausemergencyservices.com.au 38