2023-12-04
State Member for Ballina Tamara Smith MP has welcomed the completion of flood repairs, rebuilds, and infrastructure upgrades to two local public schools damaged in the 2022 Northern Rivers floods – Mullumbimby Public School and Main Arm Upper Public School.
Ms Smith has been working with the Department of Education since the floods and has pushed for build backs that see public infrastructure built better prepared for the future than before. Ms Smith is joining the Minister for Education’s delegate Emily Suvaal MLC to celebrate the completion of major remediation works, including new buildings, raised classrooms, improved play areas, new sports facilities, and freshly designed vegetable gardens and walkways.
Quotes attributable to Tamara Smith MP, Member for Ballina, and NSW Greens Education Spokesperson:
“Our kids have had a hard few years on the back of the massive disruption and trauma of the global pandemic. For all our primary school aged students the past few years been interrupted and impacted. But for our kids at Mullum and Main Arm they have had the trauma of the floods and landslides and the loss of their schools.”
“I heard first hand from students at Main Arm how the floods compounded already a very tough time for them after COVID. Their insights and observations about the future under climate change were quite startling to me as they totally got it and were schooling me! I also heard from parents how difficult it was to get their kids to alternate school sites for over a year while the schools were repaired.”
“This is a moment to celebrate the return of each school community to their much-loved places and cultures of learning. I hope that the built improvements will better support our students and teachers to be safer in the future, and their school communities better able to withstand future flooding.”
“The communities of Mullumbimby and Main Arm literally saved each other during the floods and as the slow road to recovery continues it is their strength and fortitude that inspires me to keep showing up and talking about the floods – even though most of the state, nation, and the world have moved on.
“Thousands of locals are still in desperate need after the 2022 floods, and every investment we make in community-led recovery now will save lives and public monies in the future.”
Ends.
MEDIA CONTACT – Will Black – 02 6686 7522