Paul Hargreaves, Inspector: Police in our community here, especially in Corryong and Walwa, they are isolated just by the very fact that they are an hour and a half from their brothers and sisters at Wodonga Police Station.
And here now they have around about 20 to 30 extra police straight out of Melbourne.
They’re integrated now into our community in a matter of four or five days which is their rotation.
Us as the local police are so grateful to get that support, um, and be able to work so comfortably with our city colleagues.
Ebony Nixon, Constable: I work out east, out sort of in the Eastern Suburbs of Melbourne, and I’ve been in the job three months.
So I was rostered for a bit of leave, and yeah, I got the email saying who wanted to go and put my hand up and was happy to come.
I imagine that it’s incredibly difficult letting all these strangers into your tight-knot town, and so you just want familiar faces, so to be able to sort of match up “us” with “them” tonight in a community sort of setting, put on this cricket match, and just have fun with the emergency services.
But most importantly, its all about the community here. It doesn’t matter what we’re here for, it’s just all about the community.
Paul Hargreaves: I’ve been out there today and spoken with a half-a-dozen farmers and, you know, they are stoic.
They are extremely thankful for all the emergency services and just those little things that we’re all doing. Like you’re watching the cricket game up there tonight, just making that contact, and I think being around them and giving them complete comfort and reassurance.
And where you can help these people, it’s just, ah it’s amazing, it’s a great feeling for you and it’s a fantastic feeling for the community.
And just talking to a young constable up there, she’s been in the job since November, and she just said to me “the connection with people, the way they treat you and the feeling that you get from trying to help them” and I said to her, “that’s everyday country policing.”
Ebony Nixon: They’ve taught me more than I could ever teach, you know. They’ve got strength that I don’t think I would ever have, to come here and re-build. And also the resilience of them to be happy to do that, it’s incredible.
And policing teaches you that there are some incredible people out there, but nothing that I’ve seen could ever equate to what I’ve seen here.
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