Victorian Water Minister Harriet Shing has told the Rochester Flood Mitigation Committee to forget any airspace being made available for future rain events in Lake Eppalock.
A meeting between the minister, who also has the regional development portfolio, and the group last week ended abruptly when the group’s approach to have water storage levels reduced was rejected.
Rochester Flood Mitigation Committee member Sharon Williams said she came out of the meeting feeling “gutted”.
“She slapped down the delegation of residents, telling them they live on a floodplain and they need to build their resilience,” the committee said in a statement.
“Ms Shing rejected appeals to lower Lake Eppalock to even 90 per cent of capacity — as of Friday it was sitting on 100.46 per cent — because she says an El Niño is coming and the water supply must be protected for its owners if we go into a drought or protracted dry spell.
“While the community appreciated the visit, and Ms Shing listening to all comments despite her schedule for the day running overtime, the message she delivered had absolutely nothing in it for the locals.“
Ms Williams said the residents raised their list of concerns about going into another spring with Eppalock already full of water, about the 40 per cent of Rochester’s population still living elsewhere, about the mental health of almost everyone in town and about the impact on real estate values, of homes demolished and homes still unliveable.
“Ms Shing told us the hub for mental health and wellbeing is now operational and we need a real focus on building our resilience if we are going to live on a floodplain. We just couldn’t believe it,” Ms Williams said.
“Our community has been shattered, and shattered twice in barely 10 years, and now we are living in the shadow of another flood if we were to get some significant rainfall in the catchment areas in the next month or two.
“We told Ms Shing even if a 10 per cent airspace was not the final solution, it would at least give the locals some confidence that someone in government is listening to them, and maybe help some people to sleep at night without keeping one eye open in case the water comes as fast as October last year.”
At this time in 2022, Eppalock was barely at 50 per cent full, yet one major rainfall saw its spillway system overwhelmed and water poured through Rochester at a height well beyond the official peak forecast.
Days before the peak arrived, the whole town had worked together to create sandbag and plastic defences, working to the levels they had been told the flood would reach.
Ms Williams said there was a genuine sense of community, of concern for each other and support, but all those hopes were washed away by a nightmare deluge.
“More than 20 houses have been demolished as a result of the October floods, so many are still living in caravans and tents and huge numbers of people are living anywhere but here, and the best the Andrews Labor Government can do is say it will help us build resilience,” she said.
“We were resilient in 2011, but to go through a flood even more damaging in 2022, to see someone in our community die, to see people in their 80s stuck in caravans in their backyards in the depths of winter, to know people are really starting to struggle mentally, to know all this and more is a dark cloud which has blanketed our town.
“This is our town, and yes it might be on a floodplain, but when Rochester was settled there wasn’t a potential tsunami locked up behind a wall just 80km upstream, so here’s where we are all at in 2023 and all we are asking is that someone actually listens to us, take our feelings, our losses, our hurt and our future into account.
“I have a speech from Daniel Andrews where he says he personally takes responsibility for everything that happens in this state under his watch. Well, they are not taking any responsibility in our town’s recovery and it’s as though we don’t even exist.
“Thanks for nothing.”