Source: Earthquake Commission – EQC
A team of EQC experts found a receptive audience on their roadshow to Taranaki this week.
EQC is currently visiting regional and local councils around the country to share information on the Commission’s role after a natural disaster as well as EQC’s role in preparing New Zealanders to more resilient ahead of an event.
This week, Head of Resilience Strategy and Research, Jo Horrocks, along with Senior Advisor, John Scott and Senior Technical Claims Manager Brad Dahlenburg delivered a number of presentations in New Plymouth to build better relationships with local authorities and to explain how EQC may be able to assist them.
After the EQC team had delivered a presentation at the Taranaki Welfare Coordination Group in the morning, they were then hosted at the New Plymouth District Council where they addressed local council staff as well as their colleagues from the Stratford District Council and the Taranaki Regional Council.
Jo Horrocks first provided an overview of EQC’s multiple roles and responsibilities before the group broke into two separate workshops.
In one workshop, Brad Dahlenburg focused on the Commission’s role after a disaster, how the claims process works and what damage EQCover will cover and what the complicated areas are.
Taranaki has experienced a lot of coastal erosion in recent years, so local council staff were particularly interested to find out when EQC will cover landslip damage and when land damage is considered regular erosion.
In the other workshop, John Scott, spoke about the wide variety of research EQC is involved in how councils can access and use this treasure trove of information to avoid building houses and infrastructure in areas that are more likely to suffer earthquake, flooding, landslip or volcanic damage.
The two workshops were attended by infrastructure experts, planning staff, environmental services, Civil Defence staff and building services.
Jo Horrocks said that she was pleased to such a wide variety of departments represented at the presentations.
“They were really interested to find out more about what we do and we wanted to find out more about what we can do to work with them. These visits are about sharing information but also about building key relationships that will be vital when we need to work with them in case of a local event in this area.”
During the visit, Jo was also interviewed by journalists from Radio New Zealand and the Taranaki Daily News who were keen to find out more about EQC’s visit to their city.
