DEVASTATED communities along the SA-Vic border are in the fight of their lives to continue to cross the border for work, education and medical care.
From tomorrow, the state government will lock out all but the most essential travellers from Vic, which it says is needed to protect SA residents from growing COVID-19 cases in regional Vic.
But Apsley's Paula Gust who started the Cross Border Call Out Facebook page late last week, is pleading with both state governments to not make local residents collateral damage and consider all the options, including an inclusion area for border communities.
When Mrs Gust and her husband Scott Carberry come out of the driveway of their Apsley, Vic, farm, they are just 200 metres from the SA-Vic border.
But from tomorrow because of their Vic address, they face being locked out of their local town, Naracoorte, where they have shopped and sought medical care for years.
"I don't know what we are going to do - we refuse to head into Vic to expose ourselves to the virus," she said.
Paining them even more, their 15-year-old daughter Holly is among eight Naracoorte High School students who will no longer be able to attend the SA school unless they are granted a last-minute exemption.
They have taken the desperate step of enrolling her at boarding school at Seymour College in Adelaide in the middle of the term.
"We have an application in but we don't know how it will go. If it is successful it might be months before we can see her when restrictions ease," she said.
Mrs Gust says she listened in disbelief at last week's announcement about the cross-border communities arrangement being rescinded and decided to create a Facebook page - Cross Border Call Out.
It feels like pencil pushers with their own agendas thinking they are doing what is going to work but they don't know, what gets me is they are not even trying to listen or understand.
- Paula Gust
Its reach has grown exponentially and highlights the desperate plight of many individuals faced with being unable to work, study or attend medical appointments due to the impending changes.
"It feels like pencil pushers with their own agendas thinking they are doing what is going to work but they don't know, what gets me is they are not even trying to listen or understand," she said.
"For us to get up to be heard by the big wigs we are really battling, but we have got to get this sorted for the mental health of the whole community."
A petition created on the Cross Border Call Out page on Monday night already has nearly 6500 signatures.
It pleads with SA Premier Steven Marshall and Vic Premier Dan Andrews and the two states' respective governments to "sort out the mess".
"What we had with the cross border arrangement was workable and successful with no positive cases - if we could still have it no one would be complaining," she said.
Mrs Gust believes a potential solution may be for Victoria Police to agree to enforce statutory declarations signed by Vic residents living in border communities that they will not travel more than 40kms giving the SA government more confidence.
Local MP and Member for MacKillop Nick McBride says he has advocated for border closure measures that have regard to the care of our deeply intertwined cross border communities and the efforts they are taking to avoid contracting COVID-19.
He says he also understands the need for these people to continue their daily lives, their work and education.
"Focused, risk based arrangements that recognize the care our cross border community are taking would need the support of Victorian police and therefore I am advocating for more co-ordination between police on both sides of the border to see if this could be a viable option," he said.
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