Bay Harbour: November 23, 2016

Wednesday November 23 2016
BAY HARBOUR
PAGE 17
Your Local Views
Evacuation plan essential
Heathcote
Ward
councillor
Sara
Templeton
talks about
last week’s
earthquakes,
community resilience and
being prepared for natural
disasters
Over the last week we have
been thinking a lot about the
importance of community
again.
The local community response
to the earthquakes on
November 14 was heartening,
with many people opening their
homes to those evacuated from
low lying areas of Christchurch.
Mt Pleasant’s community
response team opened up the
local school and had around
200 residents through and Civil
Defence volunteers supported
the evacuation centres.
While there were glitches with
the tsunami sirens, these issues
are being worked through as
part of the review of the entire
Civil Defence response.
This was the first time we have
had a serious threat of tsunami
since the sirens were installed
and many communities will
now want proper evacuation
plans to help the process run
more smoothly. While the job
of Civil Defence is to tell us to
evacuate, we also need to work
out the how and where.
Communities know their area
best; which routes would be best
for the different parts of their
neighbourhood and where the
high ground is. Community
boards are ideally placed to
support communities as they
develop these plans and can access
assistance from within the
wider city council organisation.
Let us know how we can help.
Just a few hours later we were
looking further afield, to communities
in North Canterbury
and Kaikoura hit so badly by
the quakes. We were on the
receiving end of amazing support
from around the country
in 2011 (we had fudge from a
family in Rolleston and muffins
from Levin among other things)
and we looked to return the
favour.
Support groups from across
the city that had formed in
2011 burst into life again and
messages with drop-off points
for supplies started coming
in through my email and on
Facebook. Red Cross also set up
an appeal and we have donated
to it online.
While the immediate provision
of goods is useful, we know
from experience just how long
support will be needed. The Red
Cross has provided support to
many community groups and
low-decile schools throughout
our city over many years now
and donating money will help
with the long-term recovery of
these communities.
As I think of the constant
shaking and damage to the
worst hit areas, I am comforted
by the knowledge that within
them volunteers and local
networks are responding as we
did and starting the long task of
supporting and rebuilding their
own communities. We will do
what we can to help.
The shaking in Christchurch
will have brought back vivid
memories for many.
Look after yourselves, your
friends, family and neighbours
and please ask for help if you or
others need it.
A reader responds to an
article from two weeks ago on
Redcliffs School relocating to
Redcliffs Park.
Dr Pat McIntosh – As a
Redcliffs resident with a passion
for the area I was personally
taken aback to read in Bay
Harbour News Nuk Korako’s
comments about the ministry’s
decision regarding Redcliffs
School.
If they had come along six
years ago and said they wanted
to rebuild the school, by forcibly
taking over our local park and
playing fields, there would have
been outrage and opposition.
But by preventing the school
from returning to the Main
Rd site for so long, in the face
of all the evidence that the site
was safe to occupy, they have so
cowed the community that this
now looks to some like a good
option.
The suggestion that psychosocial
factors were important
totally misses the point that the
reporting psychologists were
agreed that there is nothing
particularly unusual about this
situation.
All schools have to educate
their pupils to assess local dangers
– for instance a nearby busy
main road is objectively more
dangerous than the rockfall risks
at the Main Rd site.
Mitigating and managing
such anxiety is a normal part of
education, and in any case by
the time the school would return
there would be no children there
who had experienced the rockfall
events.
There has also been no attempt
to put in the balance the
psychosocial effects of keeping
the school out of the area for so
long – effects which have been
pointed out to the Ministry by
many school supporters and
community organisations.
The Executive Summary of the
Ministry report (dated October
5, 2016) points out that to rebuild
the school in Redcliffs Park
will probably be more costly
than a full rebuild on Main Rd
“not including site acquisition
costs”. It also indicates that it
will likely take longer. So why
decide to do this?
Maybe the answer lies in the
fact that Redcliffs Park is bigger
than the Main Rd site and does
not need roughly $800,000 of
bund, and has according to
the Ministry “better long-term
advantages for the investment
of Crown funds than a return
to the Main Rd site.” There we
have it, in my opinion.
But a great many local residents
will be very upset by the
proposed loss of the park, in its
waterfront location.
Once green space is built on it
is lost forever.
I urge residents to keep a close
eye on the consultation process
and plans and make their views
known.
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