Have a beer with me

Hi Scott,

Thank you so much for last week’s column about helping the pensioner with the insurance claim. I live in South Lismore and I’m still waiting for my insurance payout, and it is increasingly difficult to get any information from the insurance company. Your column has given me the much-needed incentive to keep fighting for what I am entitled to, not what they think I should settle for!

Elise

Hi Elise,

You are exactly the type of Lismore local I want to meet this Thursday night!

If you can, please come to my book launch, or my community event at the Hotel Metropole at 7.00pm (RSVPs are required for both, see below). Please spread the word with your friends. As someone who’s lived through a natural disaster myself, I know I can help.

Scott

Come have a beer with me

I was standing in the middle of the main street, staring up at the tops of the buildings.

Locals passed by, giving me strange looks.

What I was doing was trying to picture an ocean of water on the very spot where I was standing … because that’s what happened in Lismore in February.

“We were expecting water to reach 1.3 metres”, said Sarah, the owner of the 40-year-old Lismore Book Warehouse, when I met her. “That was the highest the floods had ever reached before.”

This time, the water reached a peak of … 14.3 metres in her store!

That day Sarah lost $215,000 worth of books, none of which were insured.

The next day she got in her boat and started searching for and rescuing people in her community.

“We’re not a rich area, but we stick together”, she says.

Sarah used Google Maps to get around, yet the roads she normally drove on were now as much as 5 metres below her, underwater. “Cows were coming past us with their heads bobbing up and down as they were swept downstream to their deaths.”

It was total, utter devastation.

“You know, at the time, I didn’t know whether Lismore would make it through”, Sarah told me.

And when the water eventually subsided the true scale of the destruction – and the rotting stench – became clear. The place looked and smelled like a rubbish tip for months.

The Lismore library had lost 30,000 books, and has never reopened.

“I knew that Lismore needed a bookshop”, she said.

And so, with the determination of a small business owner with her back to the wall, Sarah and her loyal team spent the next four-and-a-half months slogging away putting the family-owned bookstore back together.

“I’m just really proud we’re here today”, says Sarah.

So when my publishers were drawing up plans for the official launch of my new bestselling book, Barefoot Kids, they asked whether I wanted it to be held in Sydney or Melbourne.

“Neither”, I said. “I want it in Lismore.”

Yes, I’m really proud to say that I will be hosting my official book launch at the Lismore Book Warehouse this Thursday night (Sold out!).

Tread Your Own Path!

P.S. Straight after the book launch at 7 pm, I’ll be heading over to a local pub (Hotel Metropole) to host a “Beer With Barefoot”, with a serious purpose. If you are a local and are struggling financially, please come along and let me (and a few of my financial counsellor mates) help you sort things out. It’s totally free. It’s totally independent. It’s totally confidential. And I’ll totally shout you a beer.

Flooded

Hi Scott,

My parents were recently evacuated in the early hours of the morning and taken to temporary accommodation. Their property is flooded and the farm has sustained major damage. They are still reeling but I want to support them, and I know there is about to be a lot of paperwork. What’s your advice?

Kate

Hi Kate,

This takes me back to the bushfires of 2020.

I was sitting on a makeshift card table in the local town hall helping survivors.

The two things I learnt from that experience was:

It’s natural to be overwhelmed at the enormity of what’s hit you, and what you have ahead of you.

And, in the first few weeks of a natural disaster it’s chaos. The Government is still formulating its plans, and the insurance companies are … lawyering up. So my advice to your parents — and you, if you’re helping them — is to hold tight on the finance front for a few weeks. Don’t sign anything, don’t agree to anything — and if you do, remember there’s a cooling-off period.

However, there is something you can do: hook your parents up with a rural financial counsellor (1800 007 007). The counsellor will be able to take down your parents’ details, read through their insurance policies, and investigate what grants are available – or might become available in the weeks and months ahead.
Finally, after such a traumatic event, being with them is probably the best thing you can do right now. Good luck.

Scott.

You can taste the danger in the air

Right before a bushfire, you can taste the danger in the air.

You can smell the smoke.

You can often see the flames flickering way off in the distance.

You can hear the fire engine sirens, and see the emergency services’ utes buzzing around.

You tune in to the ABC radio to hear the latest warnings from the authorities.

And then you brace yourself as the head of the fire roars through and destroys everything in its path.

It’s sheer madness. Utter destruction.

And then moments later it’s … eerily quiet. You can walk around and survey the damage.

Floods are the exact opposite:

All you hear is rain. Then the water starts rising. It’s relentless.

Yet the water doesn’t quickly recede. It just sits there and ruins everything you own, covering everything you hold dear with rot and faeces.

There is no quick escape. Most people are trapped, and isolated, and hungry, and traumatised.

I called up a colleague of mine, Kimbah, who is right in the middle of the floods.

“I’m really just heartbroken, Scott”, she said, her voice cracking.

Kimbah runs one of the oldest financial counselling services in the country. Her office is located in the heart of Lismore, in the grand old council building that was built in 1886.

“The last time the floods came through, the water made it into the office and reached about 40 cm up the wall, which meant the bottom of all the filing cabinets got soaked. So this time, I told the team to stack things on the desks … just to be safe.”

This time, the water level reached 3.3 metres.

This time, they lost absolutely everything.

Now, you don’t sign up to be a not-for-profit financial counsellor if you want to make a quid. You do it because you care deeply about your community. And right now Lismore, and surrounding areas, are suffering through what Kimbah calls “a catastrophe of biblical proportions”.

Yet I tried to pull Kimbah back into the business of financial counselling for her clients:

“You and I know that a coping mechanism for people in a crisis is to want to get back to normal … which often results in them making poor decisions with their insurance claims. That’s something you can help with …”

“What insurance?” she snapped. “It costs people $28,000 a year for flood insurance in Lismore. Who the hell can afford that?”

Drop the anchor!

To me, what we are witnessing here is a failure of the system.

All too often it’s the most vulnerable people in our communities that become the collateral damage of these ‘once-in-a-hundred-year natural disasters’ … that seem to come around every few years.

Thankfully, the Lismore financial counselling service has been faithfully serving their community for decades … helping them stay afloat.

And, come hell or high water, Kimbah assures me they’re not going anywhere. So if you’ve been impacted by floods, call the National Debt Helpline 1800 007 007 and speak to a financial counsellor.

Tread Your Own Path!