Brimbank’s State Emergency Services unit is desperately undermanned, cash-strapped and in need of another base in the area, its unit controller believes.
Controller Claudelle Dalgleish told Star Weekly that attending more than 300 emergencies each year, each taking between 30 minutes and eight hours to complete, “stretched” the 55-member service.
And restrictions on how the group can fundraise was putting “financial pressure on an already cash-strapped local volunteer emergency service”.
Mrs Dalgleish said the Keilor-Park based unit has 55 volunteers in a facility built to house 20 to 25. “Do we have enough volunteers? The answer is no … but where do we put them? We have five vehicles, two of which are housed outside and at risk of being broken into,” she said.
Mrs Dalgleish said the group had spoken to Brimbank council about a second home in either Albion, Ardeer or Sunshine West.
“But this comes at a cost – and, with limited land available, it’s still not resolved. This limits our ability to provide an effective response, effective community engagement.”
She said the council had always met the state government subsidy dollar for dollar, giving the Brimbank SES a total annual budget of $32,000. Funding supplied is for operational expenses and is not used for large expenses, such as vehicle replacement.
“This is funded and fundraised by the volunteers of the unit … an unnecessary burden on volunteers who already give 110 per cent of their free and valuable time.”
Western District MP James Purcell called for the fire services levy to be used to help the SES.
A Brimbank council spokeswoman said the council would provide $16,000 in its 2016-17 budget as it had done in the previous two financial years.
