A Thank You event to bring together donors and recipient community organisations who were involved in the Flood Relief Fund (FRF) was held in July at the Byron Theatre.

Hosted by the NRCF with our FRF partners at Byron Community Centre, the event was an opportunity for to foster connection and share experiences away from crisis, as well as thank the many donors, volunteers, staff, and recipient organisations who had made the FRF such a huge grassroots success story for our community!

In just three months the FRF raised a whopping $1.68M for both immediate flood relief and longer-term flood recovery efforts across our Northern Rivers region.

We distributed almost $1mil in six weeks – an incredible 106 grants of up to $10,000 across the seven LGAs of the Northern Rivers region. This represented around 70% of grant applications received, with the NRCF team manually entering 42% of these applications – often speaking with community organisations who were in gumboots, in mud, mid clean-up.

Further grant rounds will be rolled out by NRCF as part of our 2022 Community Grant Round.

Some highlights from the recent event:

Acting CEO of the NRCF, Allison Henry, and President of the Byron Community Centre, Paul Jameson, thanking all donors, supporters and staff of The Flood Relief Fund initiative.

Local singer-songwriter and musician, Abbie Cardwell performed ‘Who Gonna Change?’ – a song she wrote whilst supporting the Lismore community post flood. And a song that looks into the bigger picture around natural disaster.

Guests had a great opportunity to meet, chat and reflect on the wonderful collective achievement of our community during such an impactful time.

A panel discussion, facilitated by the ABC’s Angela Catterns and made up of three donors and three grant recipients of the Flood Relief Fund shared honest, emotional, thought-provoking and celebratory insight into their experiences, and how The Flood Relief Fund was able to provide quick support within the community.

Acting CEO of the NRCF, Allison Henry, and President of the Byron Community Centre, Paul Jameson

Guests had a great opportunity to meet, chat and reflect

Local singer-songwriter and musician, Abbie Cardwell