The May 2025 Hunter and Mid North Coast flood event resulted in widespread and compounding impacts across housing, infrastructure, community wellbeing, agriculture and local economies. Nineteen local government areas were declared disaster affected, with more than 2,400 buildings inundated and over 500 homes assessed as severely damaged or destroyed. These impacts occurred within an already constrained housing market, significantly increasing displacement pressures and recovery complexity.

This presentation examines how recovery was coordinated across a large and diverse region and highlights key lessons from delivering recovery at scale. Recovery commenced while response operations were ongoing, requiring recovery systems to operate in parallel with emergency management structures. Regional governance arrangements, supported by Recovery Coordinators and multi-agency subcommittees, enabled consistent decision-making, prioritisation of shared issues and coordinated action across state agencies, local government, non-government organisations and community partners.

Key initiatives included the operation of Recovery Centres and Recovery Assistance Points, the use of Incident Management Teams to coordinate clean-up activities, large-scale debris and waste management operations, and the integration of non-traditional partners such as Disaster Relief Australia and informal volunteer groups. Embedding recovery partners directly within recovery centres improved accessibility and trust, while locally driven volunteer models enhanced surge capacity and community connection.

The recovery also exposed systemic challenges, particularly limitations in the timeliness and usefulness of impact data, severe housing constraints, and the reliance on centre-based service delivery models. Targeted outreach and engagement strategies, including culturally safe Aboriginal Recovery Assistance Points and mobile recovery services, proved critical in reaching vulnerable and disengaged populations.

Overall, the experience demonstrates that contemporary flood recovery requires early activation, adaptable governance, strong regional coordination and a deliberate focus on community-centred delivery to support sustainable recovery and resilience.