June 25, 2015
BIEDO CEO Carmel Summers says the organisation is at risk of closing by the end of the year if more funding cannot be located.
Carmel told ABC Radio this morning that disaster-relief funding which had supported many of the organisation’s programs would end on June 30.
BIEDO – the Burnett Inland Economic Development Organisation – has been using the funding to provide business financial counselling, personal counselling, rural business consulting, women’s wellness days, social media training and suicide and depression prevention activities.
Carmel, an accountant and BIEDO’s business financial counsellor who took over as CEO late last year, said the organisation had injected an estimated $7 million into the North and South Burnett economies over the past two years.
She said that the region had been hit by two floods and then a devastating drought, and she was still getting new clients to the financial counselling service as a result.
Carmel told the ABC she had spoken to different government departments about accessing funding but “nothing was concrete yet”.
“We believe it can keep going until the end of the year on a very tight budget,” she said.
South Burnett Deputy Mayor Keith Campbell, who took over as Deputy Chairman of BIEDO late last year, said the Management Committee was working to identify funding opportunities to “sustain the longevity” of BIEDO.
This was still being worked on and the Board would be updated at their meeting in August.
However, in the near future BIEDO would be moving from its long-term home at Goomeri to South Burnett Regional Council-owned premises in Murgon.
For a short term, Council would waive the rent as an in-kind contribution to BIEDO.
- External link: Carmel Summers interviewed by ABC Rural this morning
