Bulga is a town of around 1,000 people just west of Singleton. With a thriving pub and $8.50 chicken schnitzel specials, it’s the heart of the wider community. There’s no shortage of references to natural disasters that have struck this town, with floodwater markers from across the decades etched into walls, posts and the Bulga Community Centre, a town that has also been scorched by flames many times over.
In 2019, Bulga was hit unexpectedly by a bushfire. With the local brigade off fighting another blaze, emergency services were directed from far and wide to come and help preserve the village and surrounding properties.
The Bulga community rallied around itself, aware that local knowledge was key in helping to defend against the flames, as local resident Kristy Hedley remembers.
“We have a lot of residents that have come up from Sydney and are new to the community and they’ve never experienced the bushfires before, so we had a lot of people freaking out, looking at the media and seeing a lot of other towns being absolutely devastated.”
Kristy and her family have been a part of the Bulga community for generations. With outstanding community awareness and dedication, Kristy and her mum recognised the fear that was spreading through the community and requested that the Rural Fire Service call a town meeting.
“The emergency services were doing everything they could, but there was just not a lot of local information being communicated, so I started a Facebook page and began going down to the fire centre and getting information and then being able to distribute it to the community. The community were coming to me with questions and concerns, rather than going and bothering the emergency services.”
This kickstarted the Bulga Community-Led Resilience Team (CRT).
“We’re not here to do the emergency services’ job. We’re not the State Emergency Service, we’re not the firies, but community can look after community and if we can work together and know who has what resources so that when emergency services can’t get to us or can’t help out, we can help each other.”
Following the 2019 fires, Bulga was in full recovery mode. Life-giving rains had come and were rejuvenating the crops, the grass for the livestock and the trees for the birds. However, the rains never stopped, and in 2022, Bulga and the surrounding area had three consecutive floods. The worst being in July with waters reaching 9.1m. These waters cut Bulga off from support, turning it into the ‘Bulga island retreat’.
Bulga and their CRT had been preparing for an emergency like this, converting the community centre into an emergency evacuation centre and with the help of the community, were able to supply beds, games for the kids and supplies for evacuated residents.
“Broke (the town) got hit really hard by the 2022 floods, harder than Bulga and they didn’t have a CRT. I spent two weeks over there in their emergency centre and they didn’t know who lived in what houses, they didn’t know where the low-lying areas were, they didn’t understand a lot of this local knowledge, it was a little bit like, chaos” says Kristy.
“Whereas here in Bulga, we already had that sorted out and I said to them multiple times, you guys need a CRT because, right now, this information would really help everybody. The emergency services, council, the locals. It’s just being able to join those together in a structured way in an emergency situation.”
By the time an emergency hits, it’s already too late to set up a CRT. Kristy says it is invaluable to get acting on it, to ensure towns are prepared to handle emergencies. It’s not just natural disasters that the CRT’s can help with.
“We’re working on an emergency plan that covers fire and floods, but also things like outbreaks in different diseases for different animals. We have a very rural and farming community but any kind of disaster that we have, we’re a little bit more prepared for. It’s in line with the council’s plan as well, so we’re sort of aligning emergency services and the community together.”
Many regional towns don’t have a CRT of their own and Kristy is urging other towns to consider setting up something similar.
“We unfortunately waited until the fires were nearly on our doorstep before we started running around, trying to organize all this. Looking back, if we had already had that in place, it wouldn’t have been as chaos or panic stations, like we experienced back then.”
Kristy says, don’t wait for an emergency. Be prepared by talking to your family, your neighbours and wider community. Some communities already have an organisation in place that can facilitate what our CRT is doing. You might not have to start something brand new. Use the resources and connections you already have and build on them with a focus on preparedness.