THE North East Catchment Management Authority has received a further $5.36 million to finish repairing flood damaged river systems.
Work is set to continue for at least 12 months on the King, Kiewa, Ovens and Mitta rivers along with Upper Murray creeks including Cudgewa and Nariel.
Acting chief executive Jeff Taylor said the money would go towards already approved sites.
“The main type of work is around the protection and restoration of public assets such as the Gentle Annie Bridge,” he said.
“It is critical work to protect public assets and build a resilient river system.”
Work will also be done on areas where the catchment management authority has previously done work that has since been damaged by flood.
Three hundred and eighty sites have been declared eligible for work, 150 of those have been completed.
Mr Taylor said emergency works had been completed first.
A range of works including stabilisation of river beds and banks, repairs to fencing along river banks, re-vegetation, restoration of catchment assets damaged by floods and the removal of debris posing a risk to public infrastructure is to come.
“What we’re working on as a whole is to make these river systems more resilient, the reality is rivers have and always will flood,” Mr Taylor said.
The new funding, announced this week, was made through the Australian government’s natural disaster relief and recovery arrangements.
It was part of more than $16 million committed to the five catchment management authorities to deliver a range of flood recovery works.
It takes the total amount allocated to the North East Catchment Management Authority by the Commonwealth and Victorian governments for flood events from September 2010 to January this year to $8.7 million, Mr Taylor said.
He said landholders who have eligible works had been notified by the authority.
