Yalgoo shire $6m out of pocket after DFES rejects disaster recovery ...

A community in outback Western Australia says it has been left with a $6 million shortfall after emergency relief funding was rejected by authorities at the 11th hour.

Yalgoo, 450 kilometres north-east of Perth, was battered by storms in 2021 and 2022 that left roads heavily damaged.

But with the majority of repair work already completed, the Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES), which administers the state's disaster relief funding, rejected the Shire of Yalgoo's request for assistance on January 3.

Yalgoo chief executive Ian Holland said there was no way to appeal the decision and that DFES had provided inconsistent information and advice before rejecting the application.

DFES said the council failed to provide enough evidence to support its claims and did not follow procedure correctly.

Mr Holland said the storms had left the community's roads unusable.

"We had whole sections of Great Northern Highway and our road network that was a metre or so underwater," he said.

"[Flooding] washes away surfaces, washes away drains and all sorts of other infrastructure.

'Doesn't fill you with trust'

Mr Holland said road assessments and repairs were conducted by the Yalgoo Shire on the understanding that access to disaster relief funding would be available.

"We probably only had one bill left to our contractor [of the $6m] … so we would definitely like DFES to step up and assist us in that regard," he said.

"[DFES] had already approved the scope of work, so they'd agreed the damage was done by a natural disaster and it had been assessed by them and Main Roads.

"[The rejection] is devastating for the community, devastating for the companies that use our roads and our ratepayers."

Mr Holland said the decision would cost the shire close to its total yearly budget and would have a major domino effect.

"We will lose a number of our reserve accounts, which act as cushioning for when things go wrong … and we will have to cut a significant amount of our capital," he said.

Mr Holland said he had not been made aware of any way to alter the department's decision.

"It doesn't fill you with trust for the system at all," he said.

'Strict processes in place'

A DFES spokesperson said the shire failed to provide significant evidence to support its funding application.

"There are strict processes in place that must be followed in order to demonstrate that taxpayer funds are being spent appropriately," the spokesperson said.

"The Department of Fire and Emergency Services has been unable to verify that the shire followed appropriate procurement processes in contracting the work.

"DFES has made a concerted effort to allow the shire to provide this information, including providing time-limit extensions and meeting with the shire as recently as December."

Opposition leader Shane Love slammed the handling of the claim, which he said mirrored a situation in the same year when 32 gravel roads in the Shire of Victoria Plains were damaged by heavy rainfall.

He raised a grievance in parliament in 2023 about the deadlock between the shire and DFES over a $4.2 million claim for repairs.

"DFES' bureaucratic red-tape bungling has led to situations where communities have had to wait for years for money for recovery," he said.

Emergency Services Minister Steven Dawson was contacted for comment, but his office referred the ABC to DFES.