The ‘We Recover Better Together’ project was co-designed by the Community Praxis Cooperative and Sunshine Coast Council with a commitment to community-led approaches to disaster recovery arrangements.
The project aimed to strengthen community connections, explore needs and opportunities and build capacity to recover better from disasters both at the local community level and through integration with disaster management arrangements. Active citizens from neighbourhoods and organisations along with people from businesses and services participated in the project through a range of capacity building and community development initiatives related to disaster recovery and resilience. The initiatives ranged across engagement at public events, to community-led disaster management arrangements, tailored workshops with vulnerable groups and to training and sharing visual stories of elevated community connectedness. This presentation covers project highlights, applied community development frameworks and key learnings from a community-led perspective.