This morning the State Coordinator and Commissioner of Police, Grant Stevens made comments regarding how Schoolies may progress later this year.
The safety and well-being of all South Australians is the primary objective of our response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Victor Harbor has a significant community of retirees, where nearly 40 per cent of the local population are aged over 65 years.
State and local authorities are cognisant of the influx of between 5,000-10,000 school leavers to the Victor Harbor area during the traditional Schoolies celebrations; and the potential impact should an outbreak of COVID-19 occur during this time.
SAPOL and SA Health officials have been in discussions with Schoolies concert event organisers, local accommodation providers, Council representatives and local businesses with an aim to determine what Schoolies may look like this year.
These negotiations are continuing and there has been no formal cancellation of the event however with a range of restrictions still in place, particularly related to mass gatherings, the event cannot be the same as previous years. Commissioner Stevens stated, "most school leavers are fully expecting there to be something different with Schoolies this year, as with many other major events."
"As much as we'd love these students to be able to celebrate the end of their school time, this is a different year," he said.
"One of our biggest concerns is having thousands of school leavers congregating together in a large concert event without being able to implement appropriate COVID Safe measures."
Authorities are working with accommodation providers to discuss options to safely manage school leavers still planning to attend Victor Harbor and surrounding towns in November.
Commissioner Stevens said "if you have groups of 10 or 20 kids coming together in private dwellings, in private parties, each of those kids at that party will know each other, so if we do have an outbreak it will be easier to find out who's been in contact with whom.
"We just cannot have thousands of young people congregating in a concert event where they cannot sustain the required 1.5m physical distancing. This goes against everything we've put in place at this point in time."
As negotiations continue it's anticipated that more definitive information will be available to all parties concerned (business owners, parents, Year 12s) by the end of the week.
