During the rebuilding phase of the February 28, 2022, natural disaster, expert knowledge through prior experience is an invaluable resource to draw from. The Northern Rivers Reconstruction Corporation invited Thomas Corley, the Chief Recovery Officer at SBP (St Bernard Project) to visit Lismore and the Northern Rivers to see what we could learn from his 15 years of experience in disaster recovery.

SBP is a national disaster recovery and resilience organisation dedicated to shrinking the time between disaster and recovery by reducing risk, increasing resilience, and improving the recovery process by transforming the disaster sector’s systems, policies, and programs. Of course, SBP is involved with hurricanes and tornado disasters but also has a lot of experience with towns that regularly flood.

Thomas explained that SBP does a number of things in the disaster recovery and preparedness space.

"We advocate, we advise, we raise money for smaller NGOs that have a hard time raising money. We consult with government partners on how to best design disaster recovery systems."

"My part of SBP is actually rebuilding homes that are affected by tornadoes, floods and fires. So we're across the States in a number of spaces in Texas, Louisiana, Florida, South Carolina. We're also in the Bahamas and Puerto Rico where we build anywhere between 500 to 600 homes a year."

"We live by the value of that community is not defined by proximity, so even though we're based in Louisiana when there's a major storm in New York City or New Jersey, we respond. I think what's startling about walking through Lismore is just the commonality, the kind of scars on the building, the water lines that all feel familiar to spaces that we've been in the States."

"I think what's also empowering and inspiring is just walking down the main street and seeing the businesses that are embodying resiliency, that are digging deep to ensure that the fabric of Lismore, that the fabric of this community isn't tethered away because of floodwaters and I think that is felt in the States community by community and it's inspiring to feel it here today."

In terms of the recovery and the rebuild, where does Thomas feel Lismore is at?

"I think it's more or less at that state that a lot of communities are stateside for us where kind of the initial effects may be painted over or cleaned up a bit. And we're starting to see progress and we have to celebrate that progress."

"But when you drill down to the homeowner that still is living in an incomplete property and doesn't have all their furniture back, or you recognise the business that hasn't been able to put their sign back up because they're not positioned. I think that's where you start to understand that recovery is not a one-year process, it doesn't get done in 18 months. There is certainly the rebuilding that occurs over a period of time."

"I think when you've experienced the rate of flooding that Lismore does, when you see kind of the annual year ticks for where the floodwaters are, you recognise that recovery won't be done in a year or two years or five years, but it's going to be this continuous process and I think Lismore is really on the front end of that."

One of the key commonalities between the States and Australia is the ineffective disaster recovery system such as money being promised but arriving late. Thomas had three key messages for locals and government during his visit.

Think 1: SBP has identified a whole bunch of different opportunities to make recovery happen faster.

Think 2: The critical need to build back resiliently. Everywhere where SBP operates, we put houses back stronger and designed in a way that when it's hit again by a flood or a tornado it can rebound faster.

Think 3: The criticalness of preparedness, especially in a community like Lismore that has been flooded out time and time again. There's policy, there's build practices, and there's individual habits that can be adopted. So that if and when there is another flood of this level, people again can recover a heck of a lot faster if we just weave in some preparedness.

When asked how we could speed up the recovery process, Thomas replied that the number one step is to define success and what it looks like.

"If we don't know what we're aiming at, in what amount of time are we trying to have our houses built back? At what point are we going to have infrastructure? At what moment are we going to have a plan to introduce better resilience tactics for the community."

"If we don't have a definition of where we're trying to get to and when we're trying to get there, we're just putting energy into recovery without really understanding progress. So we have to define success."

"Then we have to have a culture where we talk about what's not working, and how this is not the environment, this is not the life that we want to continue to live. We know that we can't change climate change, we understand that this level of flooding will happen again."

"So it's important for us to have, number one, defined where it is we're trying to get to and in what amount of time and then be comfortable talking about problems and what's not working and try new approaches because if we just do what we've done before, we'll be back in this space two years from now, five years from now."

House Buybacks and relocations are a phase in our recovery that has long been a discussion point. Moving out of the floodplain for high-risk-to-life homes is one thing but losing that sense of community is another. What is Thomas' experience in the States?

"We've experienced it in two ways. One, the conversation about buybacks and mass kind of relocation of community in the States and you look at a place like New Orleans where it's designed in a way where the front porches for the homes are literally stacked up next to each other because that's how community exists, people talking across their porches. So, when you introduce the idea of relocating New Orleans to somewhere further into Louisiana, how do you tell someone whose great-grandfather built that house in the Lower Ninth Ward that now's the time for them to leave their neighbourhood, to leave that fabric in that network?"

"It's a real point of, I think, privileged perspective in the States to enforce this idea that we can just move people out of harm's way. So we've seen struggle at the community level of really encouraging individuals to relocate."

"Second is we've seen this work deeper down in what we call the Bayou in Louisiana, where we have homes that are flooded every single year, multiple feet of water in the home and we've seen the relocation of those communities and very small communities up to non-floodway in Louisiana. Where it was critical is, number one, tons and tons of community conversation to understand what are the sensitivities, what are the concerns, and how do we design a community space that attends to those needs. And then really explaining to homeowners and to individuals, the vulnerability that exists and staying in harm's way and what it does not only for them, but for future generations and their primary asset, which is that home, if it is in a space that is not in harm's way that will not flood every year."

"It's a relatively new space in the States to begin introducing buyback and full-on relocation and it's challenging."

The other resident headspace is the battle between understanding the past and what is in store for the future.

"I think what we see are individuals that have lived through major storms every five to 10 years. I just bought a house in New Orleans that's been standing since 1908. So every major storm that's ripped through Louisiana, this home has continued to stand in it and I think that's a reference point for how individuals approach this, in that I've been through it before, I'll go through it again."

"But I think that the gap of understanding, and this is why there's so much work to do in the preparedness space, is people don't understand that these storms are getting more intense. They're getting stronger, they're getting wetter and it's not like what you've seen before. So the philosophy of I've been able to withstand it historically, that's not an indicator of what you will be able to do in the next 5, 10 or 15 years. So, there are more individuals, I think, that are awakening to the understanding that the storms are becoming more intense and more dangerous, but there are so so many people in the States that believe I've done it before I can do it again."

There are still a lot of questions that need to be answered for Lismore and the Northern Rivers, creating a vision both collective and on an individual basis is just one. Thomas did say year one is spent on the necessary recovery and the rebuilding phase but as you enter year two the broader questions need answering.

One of Thomas' key points is rebuilding fast enough in future major floods so that the local economy rebounds quicker. Hence the need for homes and businesses to build back better using more flood-resilient materials.

Thomas likened Lismore to a small town called Joplin in Missouri where he lived for a while. Joplin was a similar population to Lismore. It was devastated by a tornado, 8000 homes were destroyed which affected a lot of low-income renters.

"Joplin had this opportunity to take a big step back and re-envision what is our community and what do we want it to be."

"I have good friends that live in Missouri and so went back about a year ago. It is striking to see the difference in what Joplin was and what Joplin is. There was an investment in a medical school, infrastructure was rebuilt, homes are designed in a way in which they can withstand major tornadoes and so there's all these major improvements."

"I think that there's only opportunity for Lismore to recognise the unique beauty of its community and the challenge in that floods have happened and floods will happen again, so how do we preserve what is uniquely beautiful about Lismore and also take this as an opportunity to invest in re-envision what community is."