Groundbreaking: John McCurdy, Member for Ovens Valley Tim McCurdy, Moira Shire Mayor Libro Mustica and SES members John Stava, Wendy Tucknott and Carrie Hawke with Mackie Mustica at the new SES Cobram unit headquarters site.
Photo by
Isabelle Harris
After eight years of planning the first sod was turned on the new Cobram SES headquarters on Monday, January 24.
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The state-of-the-art facility is expected to be finished at the end of this year.
Long-term SES member Carrie Hawke set the idea in motion with a petition in 2014 that garnered 1200 signatures in just three weeks.
Ms Hawke said she had picked out 12 plots of land for the headquarters to sit on, but kept returning to the site that was ultimately chosen.
“Every time I finished (looking), I’d come back to this one because you’ve got safety that way and safety (the other) way and you haven’t got trucks,” Ms Hawke said.
Excited: Cobram SES members John Stava, Wendy Tucknott and Carrie Hawke
Fellow SES member Wendy Tucknott said the upgrade will be an improvement to their current operational capacity.
“Better coverage for floods, storms, road rescues, just better coverage all round and better response times,” Ms Tucknott said.
The Cobram SES unit had been sharing a facility with the Tocumwal unit and had no building of their own to store equipment or operate from, which had been impacting response times.
Moira Shire Mayor Libro Mustica currently owns the land where the new headquarters will be built on and said it will improve emergency outcomes and response times.
“I’ve been pushed along by Carrie for the last decade, she sees me as one of the community people that can help with this to make this happen,” Cr Mustica said.
“I got involved (as) it’s such an essential part of our community.”
Nationals Member for Ovens Valley Tim McCurdy, who tabled Ms Hawke’s petition in Parliament in December, 2017, said the facility will help the unit respond better to all emergencies.
“No doubt it’ll actually help them with capacity for what they’ve got to store in there,” Mr McCurdy said.
He explained his father John had been rescued with SES assistance last year after he was pinned by a vehicle during a farm accident, so the issue held special significance for him.
“And like all volunteer organisations we need to have good facilities that attract people and the minute we do that, we will get more and more young people or just people involved.”
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