Joseph Biberow doesn't like to complain. He is intensely grateful for all the state government support he has received since his cabin at a Rochester caravan park, in Victoria's north, was flooded in October.
The 74-year-old pensioner was still reeling from losing precious photos and possessions when he was approved for emergency accommodation nearly 2 hours away.
His son handled the paperwork, and Mr Biberow moved into a private room at the federally-owned Centre for National Resilience at Mickleham, north of Melbourne.
There were clean sheets, helpful staff, three meals a day, and lots of support on offer.
But as time went by, Mr Biberow saw and heard things that left him worried.
"I think there were a lot of drugs involved," he said.
The Rochester man said he did not see violence, but he heard it.
"You'd hear the arguing, the fighting, the swearing," he said.
He said he also saw young children unsupervised and people who appeared drug or alcohol-affected.
The ABC has obtained incident reports from the Mickleham centre between October 15 and December 5 last year which reveal 26 incidents in the seven-week period, including family violence, drug use, threats of violence and self-harm, and verbal abuse towards staff.
The Freedom of Information application took three months to be approved and does not cover the remaining period the centre was used for flood crisis accommodation, up until March 15 this year.
Mr Biberow said he saw the behaviour of some residents deteriorate as the weeks went by.
"They sort of wrecked it for everybody," he said.
Police called regularly, documents show
In January, Victoria Police were called to the centre to remove suspected drug-making equipment, including glassware and "liquids" allegedly found in an unoccupied unit by centre staff.
Police said a 20-year-old Wallan woman was charged with trafficking dimethyltryptamine — a psychedelic drug — and possessing equipment to manufacture drugs of dependence.
Another former resident who spoke to the ABC said the facility was fantastic at first, but by the end of their stay, they "felt unsafe".
The $580 million Centre for National Resilience has the capacity to house 1,000 people and is owned by the federal government.
It was originally built as a COVID-19 quarantine facility but was opened for victims of the Victorian floods in October last year and formally closed on March 15.
The incident reports reveal staff struggled to deal with the complex behaviour of some residents, and police were regularly called for help.
One report detailed an incident on November 11 last year, where a resident ran from his unit to report an incident of family violence after his phone calls to staff went unanswered.
He was reported as being "extremely distressed and frustrated".
"Reported sounds of yelling and people being shoved against walls had escalated further. I advised resident to remain in his room and lock the door," the report stated.
Police and an ambulance were called to the centre.
The resident said he was "pissed off" as he "had been trying to call the number that he was given, and nobody had answered".
The staff member who wrote the report explained to the resident that the helpdesk was unattended overnight, and told them there were duress buttons in their rooms, which the resident was "not aware existed".
On November 20, staff reported two residents were seen in a physical fight on the perimeter fence. One pushed another up against the fence by the throat. A female person was seen slapping a male person on the face.
Police later attended and issued a family violence notice.
Two days later, police were called to the centre after a visitor left the site "loudly proclaiming his intention to self-harm".
The report said the man crossed over two barbed wire fences and the Hume Highway before police could get there.
Some residents found to be posing as flood victims
It is a very different scene 20 minutes from Rochester at the Elmore Flood Recovery Centre, which resembles a showground converted into a caravan park.
Barbie Walker, aged 77, said she would give the facility "five stars".
"I don't mean five-star like a hotel in Melbourne, but … I give it full marks for what they're doing to help people here," she said.
Since about a metre of water went through Ms Walker's Rochester unit in October, she has been "couch surfing" at family's homes or staying in a government-leased caravan at the Elmore site.
"I'm very happy here. I've got a bed, I've got a TV, air conditioning. I've got a fridge, I can heat my hot water in the microwave," she said as she showed the ABC around.
Ms Walker owns her home, but she does not have flood insurance.
She successfully applied for a state government emergency grant of about $41,000 to start refurbishing and repairing her flood-damaged home.
"I’m a thrifty person. I will make that 41,000 cover everything," she said.
"I was so blessed I got it. It’s helped me move forward."
Ms Walker and Mr Biberow are both full of praise for the state government support they have received since the October floods.
Emergency Recovery Victoria (ERV) CEO Mariela Diaz told the ABC that some residents of the Mickleham facility were found not to be flood-affected, and were pretending to be victims to access the centre.
"I wouldn't say they were gaming the system, because you have to be in a pretty hard place to go and stay somewhere at the CNR if you have somewhere safe to stay to start with," she said.
She said due to the speed of the floods and the rate people were losing their homes, the vetting process of residents did not start until weeks after the centre was open.
"The people that entered Mickleham were from a broad range of society. There wasn't a significant vetting process because we didn't want there to be such a high bar that people had to wait for weeks for accommodation," she said.
"I would hope that next time we would have the support set up very quickly so we could start that vetting process from the very beginning."
Ms Diaz said those who were asked to leave — either because they were not flood-affected or behaved inappropriately — were put into "suitable accommodation".
"No-one was exited into homelessness," she said.
Ms Diaz said the federally owned Mickleham centre was used because it was logistically able to house a large group of people, and had staff ready to work.
But its future use for emergency accommodation in Victoria is not guaranteed.
"I'm not 100 per cent sure if we would or wouldn't use it," Ms Diaz said, explaining that every emergency was different.
In a statement, ERV said the safety of residents was its priority and all had been supported to move to suitable alternative accommodation.
It said all residents were connected with a "recovery support worker" who helped provide referrals to services including financial counselling and mental health support.
ERV did not respond to questions about how many residents from Mickleham were asked to leave due to not being flood affected.
Emergency accommodation close to home key, expert says
Monash University Professor Robyn Mansfield is researching emergency accommodation and responses to disaster.
She said providing emergency accommodation in the area where natural disaster survivors live is crucial, as the rebuild and recovery can take years.
"The critical difference [between Mickelham and Elmore centres] is that with the Elmore response people are within their communities," Professor Mansfield said.
"That's the number-one support mechanism."
"Best practice is building social capital … that means creating social networks," she said.
Mr Biberow is now living at the Elmore recovery centre and is among the residents who must leave by August 15.
He hopes to be back home to his cabin as soon as possible but is not sure when that will be.
Ms Diaz told the ABC no-one at the Elmore facility would be "tipped out into homelessness".
She said that the remaining residents who had not been able to move back to their homes by the August deadline would be supported to live on their property in a caravan, or other options would be found.
Despite the problems he saw while living at the Mickleham centre, Mr Biberow said he was still in awe at the high level of government support for people who had lost their homes.
"[Australia is the] best country in the world," he said, gesturing around to the rows of caravans and cabins.
