By Jess Baker
A local water charity hero has been named a finalist for Queensland’s prestigious Volunteer of the Year Award for going above and beyond to help people in need in the Granite Belt.
Granite Belt Water Relief founder Russell Wantling said to be nominated for the award came as a complete shock to him as, in his eyes, he was just lucky to be part of a dedicated group of volunteers who were committed to lending a helping hand.
“I was very humbled to be nominated,” Russell said.
“We had over 50 volunteers. There’s no way we could have done it without the volunteers and everyone who donated their time and money.
“We’ve just done what we’ve done.”
Though Russell puts it lightly, what he achieved through Granite Belt Water is nothing short of extraordinary.
In 2019, motivated by seeing a family bucketing water out of a muddy dam and into a 1000 litre tank on the back of his ute, Russell formed a charity that would go on to support nearly 500 families.
Within a few short months, Russell and his army of volunteers were giving out close to 300,000 litres of water each week.
“To put that into perspective, we could only allocate each family 1000 litres of water each week, so that they could bath their families and wash their clothes,” he said.
“We also gave them donated bottled water for their children to take to school and for them to cook with.”
Granite Belt Water Relief later began distributing 130 bags of groceries to families each time it opened its water shed, and stock water so families could keep their livestock.
“Over the course of 18 months, Granite Belt Water Relief gave away over 16 million litres of water, over 700 pallets of bottled water, groceries, shoes, clothing, furniture, dog and stock food and so much more,” Russell said.
“And none of this would have been possible without volunteers.”
Russell said a major part of the service the charity provided during the drought was reassurance that everything would be okay – that with each day, Stanthorpe families were one step closer to rain.
In March 2021, residents of the region were offered some reprieve from the drought with heavy rainfall that spanned days.
And with the sole supply for Stanthorpe’s urban supply network Storm King Dam full once again, Russell, the charity’s volunteers, farmers, and families breathed a collective sigh of relief.
The last of Granite Belt Water Relief’s water is now being distributed to charities like Blue Care and Meals on Wheels, and goods distributed to worthy causes and individuals.
Russell said the selflessness of the charity’s many volunteers, particularly during the peak of the drought, gave him faith in people.
“I always thought I knew everyone in Stanthorpe, but when our town was in crisis I had over 60 people put their name down to help in every aspect of what we did,” he said.
“I stood on the shoulders of these giants every day and as a result of the actions of volunteers, our community survived.”
