Flood disaster brings scrutiny of Kamerunga Villas management
A Cairns strata titled complex has been put under the spotlight following a claim emergency relief volunteers were turned away but others have defended the handling of the situation.
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Strata titled Kamerunga Villas has been put under the spotlight following a claim desperately needed emergency relief volunteers were turned away from the complex, but others have defended the handling of the situation.
At the last count, of 131 units, 63 are totally without power, 17 are on limited power and 11 were still without small generators, after half a metre of water surged through the Caravonica complex on December 17 and destroyed subterranean cables.
Following an emergency meeting on Sunday, Barron River MP Craig Crawford secured approval for Queensland Reconstruction Authority to cover the cost of an interim fix.
Cairns Regional Council will oversee the provision of large generators and connection of emergency power into homes.
Mayor Terry James said council was working with electricians to get generators in, but on Thursday no generator sets had arrived after work started to prepare houses on Tuesday.
A council spokesman said generator plugs were still being installed to fuse boxes and “once this work is completed generators will be sourced”.
Mr Crawford and council recovery chair Rhonda Coghlan both indicated there had been a breakdown of communication between the residents committee and broader owner group.
“We don’t know that there’s a failure there, the body corp is obligated to have insurance but it does sound like there may not be enough in the sinking fund to cover the repair,” Ms Coghlan said.
“I’m not going to throw them under the bus because I think they are between a rock and hard place.
“The community has largely jumped in (but) the support for (residents) was never going to be enough.”
It’s understood the Kamerunga Villas sinking fund contained $130,000 at the time of the flood and annual body corporate fees of $2000 per year are among the lowest in Cairns.
A sinking fund is a pot of money made up of body corporate fees and in Queensland must cover up to 10 years’ worth of capital expenditure to pay for repairs to common property within the complex.
A rough figure to supply generators, fuel, supply and installation of generator switches at the complex to restore temporary power has been priced at about $1m as a result of the one-in-one-hundred-year flood event.
Mr Crawford was clear the re-cabling of the complex in the long term wouldn’t be funded by QRA.
“The digging up of the complex is not something that is covered by QRA that is the responsibility of (the body corp) and their insurer,” he said.
“We won’t be expecting any money back on (temporary power supply) but we don’t know how long we can sustain it for, and after a couple of months it will get annoying.
“I think there has been a lot of confusion out there between residents, that needs to be sorted out, and there is going to be some long conversations, not only about power.”
Villas resident Michelle Steinbach’s unit is still without power, and she is running a petrol generator at a cost of up to $80 per day.
Over the roar of a generator in her garage, the clearly stressed and exhausted aged care worker said she has gone almost three weeks without mains power.
“The communication is really poor with everybody, that’s probably the key thing,” she said.
She had an expectation that big industrial generators would have arrived on site by now.
“Because they said they would be,” she said.
Mr Crawford said he was aware of “differing opinions” within the complex about how the flooding and loss of power had been managed.
“We have heard reports, where organisations and volunteers and even some agencies were turned away, (but) I’m unable to really validate that,” he said.
“I want to really reassure the residents in Kamerunga Villas that we are getting these resources to you, it’s coming.”
Flood relief volunteer Kerri Mason was the first to try and get into the complex to offer clean up help and essential supplies.
She expressed a sense of frustration at being turned away.
“I arrived with a van load of stuff and (was) told this is a private residence, I’m not allowed to be here and that we didn’t want the help here’,” she said.
However Villas resident Mark Raymond stated on social media he did not know what else the residents committee or body corporate manager TCM Strata could have done.
“I am ashamed of some of my community for the amount of character assassination of the committee and our body corporate managers,” he posted.
“Life is hard sometimes and it isn’t anyone’s fault.”
Efforts to contact a member of the residents committee and TCM Strata have been unsuccessful.
Originally published as Flood disaster brings scrutiny of Kamerunga Villas management
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