Hinchinbrook floods: Ingham police to hold post-disaster talk event

Ingham police are giving locals who endured the Hinchinbrook floods the chance to speak to uniformed officers to discuss any issues raised post disaster.

Queensland Police Service in action in Ingham during the devastating Hinchinbrook floods in early February this year. Ingham police are holding an informal opportunity for locals to talk about any issues raised during or post the disaster, with nothing off the table for discussion. Picture: Cameron Bates

Ingham police are launching a new initiative to allow locals who endured the Hinchinbrook floods the informal opportunity to speak to uniformed officers to discuss any issues raised during the disaster or ongoing recovery.

Sergeant Regina Veivers, who played a key role as a liaison officer at the command centre at the Hinchinbrook Shire Council during the deadly February floods, said a mobile police facility would be in place in the Woolworths Ingham car-park after Easter from 8am to 4pm Tuesday and Wednesday.

“It’s a post-community flood chat with a police officer about anything, it doesn’t have to be about the floods, it can be about weapons licensing, it can be about home security, domestic and family violence, anything.”

Ingham Police Sergeant Regina Veivers. Picture: Cameron Bates

Sgt Veivers said that during the floods, she was heavily involved in calling members of the community about a range of issues, including SES rescues, police jobs and welfare checks.

She said that given Hinchinbrook’s aging population, officers were finding that during the thousands of calls they were logging each day that they often had to cut calls short to people left isolated by floodwaters and cut electricity supplies.

“We were checking in every couple of days, sometimes we would do a follow-up call if we believed that the person needed that conversation because a lot of them hadn’t had any type of human contact with anyone, apart from that phone call.”

Sgt Veivers said Queensland Police Service recognised that there was a gap during the almost once-in-a-lifetime flood disaster.

She said nothing was off the table for discussion, from simply having a chat with a uniformed police officer over a cup of coffee to more serious matters in a highly visible, secure location in the Woolworths car park.

“People might have children who are going back to school and want to know what programs police are doing through education about issues that are prevalent in schools, things like sexting, respectful behaviours, anything goes.”

Originally published as Hinchinbrook floods: Ingham police to hold post-disaster talk event