Community Safety Update

Lisa Sturzenegger

The purpose of this update is to ensure all staff working in or engaged with Community Safety are aware of decisions and directions being taken by the Community Safety Directorate (CSD) over the coming months.

The CSD leadership team and I are committed to taking all necessary steps to keep you informed. To achieve this, we are working on a multi-facetted approach to communications, being coordinated by Christine Elliott.



Moving Forward

The Directorate is working swiftly, but in a considered way, to return to business as usual. Part of this will be the need to manage the workload and issues that will arise from the range of inquiries, and the issues that will be generated through everyday community discussion as we all come to terms with the events of this past month.

Two key steps have been taken. The first has been to ask Alan Rhodes to coordinate our responses to the Royal Commission and other inquiries. The second has been to revisit our 08/09 Business Plan to look at what is achievable for the remainder of this year.

Alan will draw on the resources of the Directorate and the field to support him in this work. At present, Alan is preparing an approach to this task and as the detail unfolds, I will keep you informed. Access to records, administrative support, the need for data to be gathered and expertise to support him to present our views; all need to be considered in this plan.

Towards the end of next week I should be in a position to share with you all, our revised business plan. Our commitment to the iECC, support to CFA Public Affairs and now the Royal Commission and other inquiries, means that we need to review our workloads. It is very important we have clarity around these issues to ensure we have shared expectations of what can be achieved and for individuals and teams to have clear goals.

During the course of next week, Community Safety Directorate managers and staff will come together in their work units to reset or reconfirm their plans. I expect that I will be engaged with the Royal Commission and other inquiry activity. At times this may be only for short periods; however it is likely that at times this will run into a number of days. In my absence, Terry Hayes will pick up my responsibilities and act as the Director Community Safety.

Video Broadcast to Our Communities

In response to the overwhelming demand for information about the extreme weather forecasts, as well as the SMS message sent out by Victoria Police, Community Safety and Public Affairs produced a video recording with key safety messages and information.

The video presentation was uploaded to CFA TV on Monday night (2 March). It is now available on ABC Online, Fire Flyer and an update has been sent to all of CFA's 56,000 fans on Facebook as well as all those following CFA on Twitter.

CFA Public Affairs informed us that the video was viewed almost 2,500 times overnight, making it Australia's most viewed video that day in the "News and Politics" category (97th most viewed in the world in the same category).

Community Engagement and Contact

At the beginning of each week, I will be providing you with an update on community engagement and contact for the rest of the fire danger period. The report will cover the week ending on Sunday.

The statistics at present are staggering. For example, on 23 February VBIL took 5,500 calls from the public, while the CFA public website had over 1.5 million visits that resulted in over 2.5 million page views. This is the highest ever recorded by CFA. In the period from Monday 23 - Wednesday 25 February there were 46 meetings with communities held across the State. Well done to you all. This is our opportunity to engage with the previously unengaged.

For your information, overflows of calls to the Victorian Bushfire Information Line (VBIL) are picked up by Centrelink customer call centres across Australia. Over 100 lines have now been organised to manage the level of demand. On the morning of Friday 27 February, VBIL fielded an average of 200 calls per hour.

Community Development (CD)

Twenty one participants have undertaken a two-day training weekend at Quest Knox, Wantirna to become Fire Ready Victoria (FRV) presenters.

The participants were nominated by CFA Areas, in response to CFA’s increased need for resources and FRV presenters following the recent fires. This training will enable the presenters to deliver bushfire preparedness information to communities.

Welcome back to Dawn Hartog; our CD Coordinator who specialises in Children’s Education, and who has recently returned to her role at HQ in Burwood East. Dawn lives in Kinglake. She successfully defended her home when the fires came through, and since then has been doing important work in supporting her community.

Community Infrastructure (CI)

The CI team will be monitoring staff in the field, in relation to stress, workload and constraints – and will be offering support to alleviate these pressures as much as possible.

Andrew Andreou (Executive Manager) and his team are meeting with the Department of Planning and Community Development (DPCD) and the Building Commission in relation to AS3959, Wildfire Management Overlays and other associated planning provisions.

Since the recent fires, Owen Gooding, Matt Wright and Mark Holland have been supporting the Bushfire CRC with ground observations and other research matters.

Lisa Keedle has recently come on board as the On the Land Project Manager. In addition to this role Lisa is providing support to the Community Development team, including assisting with the delivery of the FRV presenter training last weekend at Quest Knox. A big welcome to Lisa.

Please note, Owen Gooding (Land Use Planning Coordinator) is now on secondment to DSE for three months.

Integrated Fire Management Planning (IFMP)

A number of planned Regional Strategic Fire Management Planning Committee meeting dates have been postponed given the current circumstances and new dates are being set, pending the status of the fires at that time. The Network Managers have been asked to work with Regional Chairpersons to move issues along as circumstances allow.

Two spatial mapping tools currently being investigated to inform integrated fire management planning; have recently been applied to support operational planning and develop the Melbourne and Catchments Fire Control Strategy.

On a personal note, Steve Pascoe the MAV Consultation and Communication Manager survived the recent fires, but lost his house and all possessions. Steve and his family are well. Hopefully we’ll see him back at work with us very soon. Our best wishes go to Steve and his family.

Geospatial Information System Services

Our GIS team has been working around the clock since the beginning of February to provide mapping and professional spatial services to the iECC and ICCs.

A key element of this work is mapping fire perimeters, which is critical to incident planning and supporting community information meetings, as well as a range of other uses.

Fire Equipment Maintenance (FEM)

A large number of FEM brigades have been significantly affected or engaged with the recent fires. Recognising this, the FEM management Team met recently to set up a process, to work through regions to contact these brigades to see if they need support to manage their FEM activity.

On a happy note, Renay Cowan will depart in the middle of next week on maternity leave. Best wishes Renay. While Renay will be missed, Noelene Gilby will be stepping up into the leadership role for the FEM administrative team in Bendigo.

CRC Research

Earlier advice has been provided, that the CRC has been requested by CFA and DSE to undertake research into the February fires. Alan Rhodes is working closely with the CRC research team to ensure that CFA has the best opportunity to realise the benefits and outcomes of this project. The CRC team has been in the field since 14 February, researching the fire behaviour, its impact on buildings and human behaviour during the fires. It is a large team of about 30 researchers who come from fire services and learning institutions from around Australia and overseas. A number of CFA staff have been contributing to the team.

Mark Holland, one of the CSD’s Land Use Planning Coordinators, recently spent some time in the research team. Mark was looking at fire behaviour in a team led by Jon Boura (ex-CFA) and Lachlan McCaw from Western Australia.

Mark said his role was to take a broad view of the fires and map their spread over time. He was mainly focused on the events of 7 February and used reference points like ‘leaf freeze’ and ‘crown damage’ to inform his work. Mark said it was a good experience that has provided him with some useful knowledge on fire behaviour and as a side benefit, increased his professional network of contacts in the CRC and AFAC.

Managers Community Safety (MCS)

Last week, CSD management met with the MCS for our regular MCS meeting. The meeting provided an opportunity to share our experiences of 7 February and the subsequent activity in the following days since then. This was a moving and enriching experience, yet it also gave me great confidence in the capacity of the CSD leadership team and their staff to rise to the occasion and meet the needs of our communities.

A key discussion point in the meeting was the significant increase in demand from communities for information. In addition, the meeting focused on the directions of the Directorate, which I have outlined above in ‘Moving Forward’. The meeting resolved to meet monthly for the next few months.

CSD Review

For the past 12 months, the Community Safety Directorate Review has been underway and it concluded late in 2008. The next steps from this were to implement some of the key recommendations from the Review, which were:

1. Adoption of principles
2. Develop work processes to improve area engagement
3. Adoption of three function areas
4. Consider further opportunities for review
5. Next steps

Much of this work has already commenced, however a key piece of work was in Recommendation 3, which largely entailed the scoping of three roles to head up these functional portfolios.

Given the recent events, I have made a decision to postpone the implementation of this part at this stage. Community Safety will have a large part to play in the Royal Commission and we will have much to learn and gain for it. As the Royal Commission is to provide some interim recommendations ahead of the next fire season (around late August 2009), I am keeping the Directorate structure in place for business continuity. I will continue on with implementing this part after the interim report comes out from the Royal Commission.

On behalf of Community Safety, I would like to thank each and every one of you for your contribution towards making our communities safe.



Lisa Sturzenegger
Director Community Safety

Released 5 March 2009