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Counselling & Support Services Won’t Desert Bushfire Affected Communities |
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 Friday 30 July 2010
Centacare Catholic Family Services’ Bushfire Community Recovery Service wants to reassure bushfire affected community members that counselling and support services will not desert them. There was a concern expressed by some Kinglake residents in the Herald Sun today that, “There will come the day very soon when all the departments will walk away.” They said ‘a group of Kinglake residents have come together to set up a project to train community members to counsel neighbours and friends’.
As Bushfire Community Recovery Service Project Coordinator Janet Cribbes says, “Those community support networks are really important but we want to reassure community members that we will provide vital counselling, community development and other support services on an ongoing basis. We know community members are still doing it tough, relationships are strained and families need all the support they can get. Our counsellors and community development workers have become part of the fabric of these communities and we won’t desert them.”
Centacare CEO Fr Joe Caddy adds, “We made an initial commitment for our Bushfire Community Recovery Service to operate for three years but it’s clear there will be ongoing support needs in the bushfire affected communities - so we are planning a permanent presence.
Janet Cribbes says, “Counselling services are vital but we have also provided many different avenues to facilitate people coming together so they can share the healing journey. We work with community members to fund community driven projects such as the first men’s getaways, the Marysville Marathon, the Placemaking Workshop and the St Andrew’s Masquerade Ball. We have also facilitated the Women of the Ranges support group, the Marysville Big Screen Project and the animation project for children and teenagers. We have been facilitating events and providing loss and grief programs for school students and developing a habitat rejuvenation project with schools and other community members. We have supplied a wood splitter and trailer for delivery of emergency firewood. Our counsellors and community development workers are spread from Whittlesea across the Yarra Ranges including Kinglake and Strathewen and out to Yea, Alexandra and Flowerdale. Our team can come to community members and work with them in whatever capacity as needed.”
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