The 2023 Floodplain Management Australia (FMA) National Conference was held recently in Sydney, with three Lismore City Councillors making the trip.

FMA is an organisation that promotes wise floodplain development and helping reduce the risks of flooding to life and property.

The theme of the conference this year was “preparing for the unprecedented flood”, which focused on applying lessons from recent floods and new research to better manage the increasing costs of extreme weather events.

Councillor Andrew Gordon, who attended the conference as the representative for Rous County Council, said everyone was looking to Lismore for answers.

“It was a learning experience – so you do learn lots from it – but, the dilemma for us is that Lismore has now become the poster child for floods,” he said.

“The information that we're hearing is mostly stuff that we've heard previously, but the good thing about it is that other regions are learning from our experience.”

Lismore City Councillor Elly Bird also attended the conference, and said she wasn’t surprised people were learning from Lismore.

“The sector will always be looking to learn from the most recent, and biggest events,” she said.

“What has happened here in Lismore and in other communities really is something that the sector needs to look closely at, and understand.”

“Unfortunately, we are in uncharted territory with our disaster and our response to the disaster.”

“We should tell our story as often as we can so that others have an opportunity to learn from it.”

The FMA Conference has been held annually for over 50 years and is the most respected flood risk management event held in Australia.

The Conference brought together over 350 flood professionals and community members with interests in flood risk management.

Councillor Bird said she attended a number of workshops during the conference, mostly focused on floodplain modelling and planning.

“I was particularly interested in some of the sessions that were focused on community messaging and how we inform communities about flood risk,” she said.

“Whilst there's no significant rain event occurring, we know that's really challenging, so always interesting to attend those sorts of sessions.”

“We heard the message about how important clear, consistent messages from trusted sources are - and of course, for those messages to be as accurate as possible.”

Councillor Big Rob also represented Lismore City Council, and told the Lismore App some of his takeaways from the conference.

“Aboriginal knowledge tells us that, it did not happen because of climate change, although climate change may have contributed,” he said.

“There is so much simple and not too expensive technology available which we can implement to help with early warning and better monitoring, as well as some flood mitigation options which will help in areas with lower flood levels.”

“My motion was also carried unanimously to allow audio-visual link access at quarterly FMA meetings held in Brisbane and Sydney, including the workshops after each meeting.”

“This will allow access to invaluable information at no extra cost of travel and accommodation to ratepayers.”