About the Author

Brenton Stacey

Brenton is Avondale University’s Public Relations and Philanthropy Officer. He brings to the role experience as a communicator in publishing, media relations, public relations, radio and television, mostly within the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the South Pacific and its entities.

Floods bring alumnus first test as new mayor

What an initiation. Elected in December last year, the new mayor of Lismore—Avondale alumnus Steve Krieg (BEd, 1994)—is now helping lead the city’s response to the worst flood in its history. The one-in-500-year weather event “has led to many hundreds, if not thousands, of people being evacuated with little more than the clothes on their back,” said Steve when announcing a Lismore flood appeal yesterday. The statistics are personal: Steve had to evacuate both his business and his home. “I feel your pain,” he told residents in a video posted to the council’s Facebook page on Tuesday, but “now is not a time to be angry. Now is a time to . . . come together and work together.”

This call for solidarity comes from a longstanding connection with the community: Steve has lived in the Northern Rivers for more than 20 years. Born and raised in Western Australia, he moved to Avondale at 19 years of age then, after graduating, got work in Brisbane before heading across the Nullarbor again to teach at an agricultural boarding school. “The boys were sent to us from all over the state because their schools couldn’t handle them. It was seven days a week, 24 hours a day because the boys would run away at two o’clock in the morning and you’d be up trying to find them.” With his then wife wanting to return east so she could be closer to family, Steve took a call from a former classmate. “He said he had a job for me in Casino and I’ve been in the area ever since.”

Major mid-life changes prompted Steve to explore new opportunities. He and his brother-in-law bought a cafe in the Lismore CBD. “I thought if I try hard enough, I’ll learn the job and we’ll get on with it. I’d never owned a business or been involved in business, so it was sink or swim. And that’s sort of how I like it.” Now it’s just Steve and wife Julianne running the business. The couple have three daughters and Steve a son, Sam, and a daughter, Jess, from his first marriage.

Perhaps influenced by their father, Sam (BA/BTch, 2021) and Jess (BNurs, 2020) also studied at Avondale. Steve enjoyed his time here. He chose Avondale because it offered a change from life in the West, “a chance to broaden horizons.”

The devastation wrought by rain over the past week is yet another begin-again moment. “The road to recovery is going to be very slow,” warned Steve is his flood appeal announcement. A self-described “placid guy,” he appears to have the right personality for the difficult task ahead. “I’m not one to get intimidated,” he says, “and I think there’s always a solution to any problem.” Steve will need this optimism as the floodwater recedes.—with Sara Browne/The Lismore App