We are working towards a consistent and integrated approach to fire management planning with Victorian agencies, and state and local government.

This includes representing councils on a number of state-level fire-related committees, such as the State Fire Management Planning Committee.

We coordinated the local government response to the 2009 Victorian Bushfire Royal Commission’s final report recommendations [PDF] and the Victorian Government’s implementation strategy [PDF].

As a result of the Royal Commission process, councils are implementing a number of new fire-related policy and programs, including the establishment of neighbourhood safer places and supporting the development of township protection plans for local communities.

To support councils with the increased workload, we lobbied for state-funded additional resources for councils and ran a recruitment process to engage fire and emergency management coordinators for councils with high bushfire risk.

We also wrote a submission in response to the Victorian Government’s Fire services property levy options paper [PDF].