Staff at the community preschool in Jamberoo, run in an extension of the School of Arts owned by Council, have spent the last two days again mopping up flood damage at the centre.

“This is our sixth flood plus other close calls. We’ve had enough,” says Jamberoo Preschool’s Director, Belinda Hibbert.

“We can’t keep doing this - emotionally, physically and because of the inconvenience for our families.

“The ideal thing for us would be to move, but there is nowhere to go.

“Council did a flood study in 2021 and nothing has come of it.”

With damage estimated to be around the amount of their excess - $30,000 – Ms Hibbert says the not-for-profit is trying not to do a claim as it will increase the excess further.

“We didn’t lose as much this time because we have put a lot of furniture up on wheels, but we have lost carpets, floor cushions, books and other things as the water was ankle deep throughout the centre.

“We moved all the furniture into the School of Arts so we had a blank canvas to clean and go through everything to assess the damage.”

Outside had deeper water flowing through, which damaged a new part of the playground and a recently built pathway put in to make the area accessible to a child in a wheelchair.

While the children will be coming back to the centre on Monday, the playground will be out of bounds until testing is done to make sure it hasn’t been contaminated.

“Steve from the butcher wants to do a fundraiser for us next Saturday, which is really lovely,” says Ms Hibbert, who knows this is the start of much more fundraising.

However as long term tenants, she wants Council to do something to stop it happening again.

“We need Council to give us a short term solution so the building doesn’t keep flooding and then a long term solution to stop it happening altogether.

“The water from the drain outside the front door went up waist high and then flooded in through the doors.

“We are just lucky it happened in the middle of the night, and not when the children were here. We have a flood evacuation plan we practice, but can you imagine the trauma for the children if it should happen?”

Belinda Hibbert says a security camera shows water from this drain gushing up as high as the fence

Both Gareth Ward, Member for Kiama and independent candidate at the election, and Jane Stroud, Council’s CEO, visited the preschool this morning to talk with Ms Hibbert and see the situation for themselves.

“I think we urgently need to find a solution, but there is only around $50,000 in the budget to implement recommendations from the flood study,” says Ms Stroud, who will be seeing if more money can be allocated during the quarterly review.

“We should see whatever we do as an interim solution, as this really isn’t an appropriate location for the preschool in the long term, particularly with Education NSW

wanting them all to be sited within school grounds within a few years.”

Mr Ward agrees on the need for a short term and long term solution.

"Belinda and her amazing team do an incredible job. But they shouldn't have to put up with flooding continuing to interrupt the important work they do in early learning. Our kids and families deserve better.

"This is a council building. Council has been aware of the flooding issues and they need to take urgent action to stop this from happening. No more 'studies' - we need real action.

"I'll be writing to the Minister for Early Childhood to examine options for a new centre either on the Jamberoo Public School site or closer to the primary school.”