Lithgow Council will receive up to $250,000 of funding under the Bushfire Community Recovery and Resilience Fund to assist the region in the recovery from last summer's horrific bushfire season.
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Large sections of Lithgow Council LGA were impacted by the 2019-20 fires, making the council eligible for funding to support its vast recovery process.
The funding arrangement between the Commonwealth and NSW governments allows investment in projects that will directly benefit recovery efforts and help communities rebuild.
Lithgow Mayor Ray Thompson welcomed this support for locally led recovery and said spending the money has to be done on the right things.
"We know that community-led recoveries provide the best chance for people to get back on their feet. Ensuring the correct level and type of support is provided for residents and towns to come out the other side with even greater resilience and hope for the future," Mayor Thompson said.
In the news:
"The recovery side of things and I really applaud the government for giving us this funding. This is the second lot of funding we've received virtually, so in saying that we've most probably got about half a million in funding I'd say with the second $250,000 that Minister Toole announced the other day which is absolutely fantastic.
"They're the sort of things that we have to make sure that we get right.
"The $250,000, we will try and put things together that will help small business and get things in the town rolling again. This outage at Mount Piper coming up to Christmas will give our economy especially the people who have been doing it tough in hospitality and so forth. They'll be full for the next three months which will certainly help."
Mayor Thompson also touched on the struggles the Lithgow area has faced in the last number of years with bushfires and whether we could see a repeat of last year's fires.
"I very much doubt it. In saying that there's parts of Lithgow that are at risk. So the other side of things, I believe there won't be near as much foliage on the ground as far as that goes because that would have been burned in the last one," he said.
"There won't be as much stuff to burn to get the fire really going, especially from the northern side. And that's generally where our fires have been coming from."
"To me, and as far as firies are concerned too - sometimes they haven't had a chance to do any back burning or as much reduction burning as they'd like to get done. And that was most probably part and parcel in this particular year with COVID and everything. They most probably would have loved to get a lot more done than they have."
He said last year's efforts were a sight to behold.
"I know our firies have really been trying to get on top of things, our RFS and all our emergency services. It was something to be believed the way that they tied everything together last Christmas," he said.
"It was absolutely amazing to see the way that all the emergency services worked together."
For more information on the funding, visit https://www.emergency.nsw.gov.au/
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