Sally comes from a farming background in Southern Monaro NSW, just below the snow line in the high country. She raised her family in East Gippsland near the stunning Gippsland Lakes, and now has grandchildren and lives in NZ / Aotearoa.
Sally is a disaster recovery specialist with over 27 years experience in managing recovery operations across the Pacific, New Zealand, Australia, and Asia. Sally has effectively managed many types of relief and disaster recovery operations following bushfires, cyclones, floods, earthquakes, droughts, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions.
Sally is committed to social justice principles, and her skills have been utilised to develop ‘community led’ and ‘strengths based’ recovery approaches. She is also experienced in monitoring and evaluating recovery programs.
Her work spans diverse aspects of emergency management, disaster preparedness, adaptive change approaches, infrastructure rehabilitation, immediate and longer-term housing solutions, and economic revitalisation. Sally also has experience in designing and implementing relocation housing options for displaced people to address future risks.
These roles have been undertaken whilst working for either the International Federation of Red Cross / Red Crescent, Australia Red Cross, all three levels of Government in Australia, and in NZ with Local Government and the Civil Defence.
Sally has been recognised in her work by several awards including, a Churchill Fellowship for Disaster Recovery Work, Australian Red Cross – Meritorious Service Award, Emergency Management Australia Safer Communities Award- Australian Division, Victorian Government for her work in Bushfires, and Commendation from Australian Government EMA for outstanding contribution to Cyclone Larry.
Sally is very interested in further developing the capabilities of the recovery workforce . As well as working with ACIM Solutions, she delivers training in the Leadership in Response and Recovery Course in NZ , and coaches international students undertaking research for a Humanitarian Diplomacy course.
