COMMUNITY members keeping the Redlands safe and resilient were recognised last weekend as the Redland City SES Unit hosted its end of year awards.
The unit is comprised of 145 volunteer members across four groups in Cleveland, Redland Bay, North Stradbroke Island, and Southern Moreton Bay Islands, combining to complete over 20,700 volunteer hours over the past 12 months.
Deputy local controller Di Vandermeer said the annual awards were an opportunity to recognise those volunteers who continually go above and beyond.
“All of our general members are volunteers, so they give their time freely to help the community, and it’s one way of us recognising their outstanding effort,” she said.
“Many of these people work full time, they have families, they do this of their free will in their personal time, so it needs to have recognition for a job well done.”
Each group recognised its members by awarding Group Member of the Year, New Member Achievement, and Team Leader of the Year awards.
The Redland City SES Unit then presented Trainer of the Year, Team Leader of the Year, Group Leader of the Year, and Volunteer Community Education Excellence awards.
Nine members who received a Regional SES Week Award earlier in the year were also recognised, as were members who reached membership milestones, and those members who also received awards at the Queensland SES Awards in September.
Speaking on the night, Redland Mayor Jos Mitchell said this recognition showed how crucial local SES volunteers were in difficult times.
“Whether tarping roofs after severe storms, moving fallen trees and responding to flood incidents, or helping with evacuations, first aid and search and rescue, our SES members do us proud,” Mayor Mitchell said.
“No less important are those with non-field roles in administration, community education and operational support who are essential to the smooth coordination of operations.”
The awards were held at Redlands RSL on Saturday, November 30, with inclement weather the following day highlighting the importance of community resilience and preparedness.
Ms Vandermeer said six of the seven jobs the SES unit attended to on Sunday, November 31 were related to unkept gutters.
“90% of jobs are because of lack of maintenance, mostly people not cleaning their gutters,” she said.
“The backing up of drains also causes a lot of flooding, particularly when we have a lot of rain in a short space of time.
“Trees hanging over property also cause damage.”
Ms Vandermeer went on to suggest sing the Redland City Disaster Dashboard to find important information about being prepared for storm season.
The dashboard is at disaster.redland.qld.gov.au.
Redland City SES Unit Award recipients
Trainer of the Year: Luke Forster
Team Leader of the Year: Steve Hayes
Group Leader of the Year: Ricky Cook
Volunteer Community Education Excellence Award: Brendon Linning
