Floods in Queensland Australia. Charity for Flood Relief

[distaudio]

Here in the state of Queensland in Australia we have been hit by the worst disaster in our state's history. To give you an idea of the magnitude of this disaster, three-quarters of the state of Queensland has been declared a disaster zone. Queensland is roughly two and a half times the size of the state of Texas.

The floods have forced the evacuation of thousands of people from towns and cities. At least 31 towns and over 200,000 people have been affected. Damage initially was estimated at around 1 billion dollars; the most recent estimate of damage and lost revenue is now about 10 billion dollars. Over 143,000 homes and businesses are without power. At present, 12 people have been confirmed dead and 43 persons missing.

So for the rest of the month of January all proceeds from the download of my album Milieu Control will be donated to the Queensland State Premier's Flood Relief Appeal.


Please visit the distaudio bandcamp page to make your donation
http://distaudio.bandcamp.com/album/milieu-control


To everyone dramatically impacted, my condolences go out to each and every one of you. Also a big thanks to all the volunteers and emergency services crews.

So please give as much as you can to help the people of Queensland.

Thank you.

[earthloop]

I hear you! I was just writing a full on explanation of the situation with links to pictures, vids etc but I think I will just voice my support for your succinct, to the point post.

I am in W.A. (other side of the country for non Australians) where there is NO water and a heat wave! This disaster in Queensland demonstrates that we should never take mother nature for granted... and that we should all be ready to support each other in times of trouble because you never know when you will need a fellow human beings help!

Some of the video of what has happened is terrifying! Good luck and well wishes to all people in the disaster zone!

[alex.the.forge]

I'd be careful doing that if I were you - Tom Cosm from these forums had his paypal account suspended for trying to collect for a charity without being registered. It's actually illegal. You'd be better off just pointing people to the Premier's fund or some other charity.

http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.html

You can sell your album other ways man.

[distaudio]

I'd be careful doing that if I were you - Tom Cosm from these forums had his paypal account suspended for trying to collect for a charity without being registered. It's actually illegal. You'd be better off just pointing people to the Premier's fund or some other charity.

http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.html

You can sell your album other ways man.

Thanks, I have considered that. But to be honest illegal or not I could not give a rats arse. I'm honest person and have been up to my arse in mud helping out with the clean up.

The last thing people need at this point is bureaucracy getting the way of help.

If people want something for their donation then that is up to them.

Tom did a great thing with raising money for the distaster in Haiti and I bet after Paypal flexing the bureaucratic muscle I'm sure he wouldn't be willing to do something like that again.

Once the funds have been collected by the end of the month I am going to be posting a receipt of the donation for all to see.

[Forge.]

Honest or not you just might lose access to your funds, that's what happened to Tom and it was quite an arse ache for him for quite a while IIRC. Premiers fund will probably get to the right people more quickly. Maybe u could just donate the album to people who donate if u think they need more of an incentive than just compassion? I dunno it's none of my business, except I live in west end which as youd know was one of the hardest hit areas too but I was lucky and only lost power for a few days, but obviously it's something I'm pretty concerned about too. just my 2c.

[distaudio]

Honest or not you just might lose access to your funds, that's what happened to Tom and it was quite an arse ache for him for quite a while IIRC. Premiers fund will probably get to the right people more quickly. Maybe u could just donate the album to people who donate if u think they need more of an incentive than just compassion? I dunno it's none of my business, except I live in west end which as youd know was one of the hardest hit areas too but I was lucky and only lost power for a few days, but obviously it's something I'm pretty concerned about too. just my 2c.

I was considering givin the album to those who have already donated but I'm not sure how to verify whether someone has done so. I guess people will get some sort of receipt which they could email to me (of course omitting the personal details on it)

I will also call the Premiers flood relief phone line and find out what documentation I need in order to make it legit and on the level with paypal.

[distaudio]

Ok.

If you have donated to the Premiers Queensland Fund Relief Fund (http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.html) please forward a copy of your receipt to floodrelief@distaudio.com and a download of the email will be sent to you. Please ensure you omit any personal information prior to sending for your privacy.

Thanks to abletontrainer.com for verifying that the idea I had in the first place wasn't so dumb after all

[Forge.]

in any case, it's a nice gesture and good to be bringing people's attention to it.

Weirdly enough it was people overseas who first started sending me emails asking if everything was okay and I was kind of oblivious because I never watch the news…. didn't realise how bad it was until practically the day or day before the peak….. really weird…. my son goes to school right close to the areas worst hit and he was in vacation care the day before and his mum rang me all freaked out saying I needed to go and pick him up because they were considering evacuating and I was all blase about it like she was just being all over-cautious because I had no idea about it, and I'd even dropped him off there that morning!

But I live in a bit of a bubble really….music, music technology, internet and usually avoid shitty depressing news at all costs, much prefer it that way but occasionally you risk it biting you on the arse!

[distaudio]

In todays world with people over reacting (especially in the media) about the mildest of things it is really hard to gauge the severity of an issue.

Hopefully it one positive to come out of this is that people will gain some perspective on what is really a problem.
Also after helping out around Rosalie yesterday and dropping off some baked goodies it is great to see people who are complete strangers helping out.

We helped out some friends Friday in cleaning out their Wine Cellar business. Clearing out their store room and cleaning bottles there were plenty of people lending a hand. We went on to taking out the wooden shelving units in the shop and throwing them out on the street. By the time I went back inside and carried out another one there were 10+ people kicking and smashing the shelving units to break them down and put them into the skip bins. No asking, no prompting just random people all helping out and getting shit done.

Today my lady baked some goodies to take down to one of the free lunch marques setup at another part of Rosalie. There were fire fighters and state emergency service people along with volunteers everywhere on the street. They had a BBQ set up with free food and tables of baked stuff along with a 5 piece band playing covers out the front of someones house. It was like a block party, it was amazing.

[Forge.]

...along with a 5 piece band playing covers out the front of someones house. It was like a block party, it was amazing.

typical musicians trying to get out of doing REAL work! j/k

But seriously, that's awesome, sounds like people really made the best of a bad situation.

Apparently you can get the govt disaster fund if your power was out for more than 48 hours…. could just let them keep it I suppose, but centrelink is federal and it's a good way of making sure it goes to state/local directly for the flood fund and not to something else….

So if your power was off for 48 hours or more or your property was damaged etc make sure you look into it if you haven't, it's there for the taking and the States have enough trouble getting cash from the Fed Govt as it is….

BTW - pretty good doco on La Nina on ABC iview: http://www.abc.net.au/iview/#/view/371901