Hello everyone,
It’s been an energising month for the FRRR team, with lots of meetings with our partners, supporters and community groups, plus the opportunity to share some of our insights at various conferences, events and forums. A particular highlight for me was spending a week in Brisbane, beginning with our quarterly Board meeting. It coincided with the ‘Ekka’ – the Royal Brisbane Show – so it was also a wonderful opportunity to catch up with many community leaders, as well as our Directors and to meet with several state and federal MPs and senators who were also in town.
It was a chance to highlight some of the key issues that we know communities are grappling with, such as place-based models of service in remote and rural areas, the potential for community-owned services and assets as a solution for sustaining services, the ‘how’ of supporting communities to truly be at the table in disaster preparedness and resilience, and in the energy transition.
Nina, Caroline and Brooke were also in Brisbane for the Australian Institute of Disaster Resilience conference. It was a wonderful opportunity to share some of our work around the Disaster Resilient: Future Ready program. If you missed it, check out Nina’s article summarising her presentation.
In other news, it was exciting to see the Regeneration Leadership Program get underway in the Bega Valley. This training, which is being delivered by our partners ARLF, is part of the National Emergency Management Agency’s funding of our IRCF program. Building local capacity is core to this program, especially as part of supporting the ongoing bushfire recovery efforts, so we are really pleased to be supporting this opportunity.
As you’ll read below, our team is reviewing many funding requests from across the country – always inspiring and insightful. I look forward to sharing details of great ideas and solutions that will be funded in remote, rural and regional Australia in next month’s update.
Until then,
Natalie Egleton
Chief Executive Officer