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More than $50,000 has been raised by the Whanganui Mayoral Relief Fund for those affected by Cyclone Gabrielle but it’s still unclear exactly where it will be heading.
Mayor Andrew Tripe said 100 per cent would go to cyclone relief.
“It’s most likely to be directed to our Local Government New Zealand zone three colleagues like Gisborne, Wairoa, Napier, Hastings, Central Hawke’s Bay and Tararua, he said.
“We need to find out where the financial aspect is going to have the greatest impact, and where resourcing is going to have the greatest impact.”
At this stage, the fund - which opened on February 18 - would remain open indefinitely.
“I don’t think now is the right time to put a cut-off date on it. Let’s keep it open until further notice,” he said.
Whanganui has paired with Hastings as part of Local Government New Zealand’s adopt-a-community, a fundraising initiative that partners councils with cyclone-stricken centres.
The council was still working out what proportion of the Mayoral Relief Fund would go to Hastings, Tripe said.
He had been in correspondence with Hastings mayor Sandra Hazlehurst and received information from Hastings District Council outlining what its primary focus areas were.
Hastings was still in the response phase and staff were busy with many starting to get tired, Tripe said.
“Things are still very uncertain and a lot of clean-up is happening.
“The first thing is the relief of their PIM (public information management) staff, who have been working overtime.
“They need solid waste supervisors for transfer stations and landfills, and transport operations professionals as well. It’s personnel on the ground who have worked overtime, through the weekends, and haven’t seen their families.”
Tripe said Hastings had offered AirBnBs and food to Whanganui council staff who could help in the relief effort.
“Within an hour of receiving that email, we went out to find out where we could release help. We are still awaiting who of our team and specialists can go.
“They (Hastings) need our people more than we need them. There is still plenty of work to do in Whanganui but they’ve got more.”
Whanganui District Council emergency manager Tim Crowe. Photo / Ben Carter
Whanganui District Council emergency manager Tim Crowe said one staff member was returning from Hawkes Bay on Thursday, with another flying out on Wednesday.
Workers usually went for five to six days and had a specific role, such as operations, intelligence, and logistics support.
“The rest of our operators came back on Friday night who were working in Wairoa and other places - ground zero,” Crowe said.
“We have a couple of other staff on standby and registered with the National Emergency Management Agency to deploy if the need is there.”
Crowe said the recovery stage involved clearing away rubbish and silt.
“It’s just what you see on the news. Things are bloody rough if you’re over there, to be honest.
“My brother is a firefighter in Napier and he’s been pretty busy. I’ve heard from him once since all this happened. We know from experience that floods cause a lot of heartache.”
Former Whanganui mayor Annette Main led the council when the city and surrounding areas were hit by flooding in 2015.
Andrew Tripe with a donation bucket and eftpos machine during a 'Community Korero' event at Majestic Square this week. Photo / Bevan Conley
While there had been a lot of government support afterwards, there hadn’t been relief funds from other councils, she said.
“It (the flood) received a lot of media coverage but it didn’t agenda the kind of support that we are seeing at the moment.
“Generally, the scale (of Cyclone Gabrielle) seems to be so much bigger, and in terms of Andrew’s fund, I think you’ll see a lot of Whanganui people that feel grateful they’ve never had to go through something like this.
“It’s a situation we might have to face in the future ourselves, and I think people will be nervous. Every council has got a lot of work to do to really make sure they understand what might happen when these deluges of rain happen.”
Tripe said two council sub-committees had been formed to manage the Cyclone Gabrielle relief effort - financial and non-financial.
“The most visible response from Whanganui will be the financial one,” he said.
