Almost two years later, Mr Lucas sat before the Dunedin City Council (DCC) to share his late father’s horrific experience with flooding in the low-lying suburb and urged them to do more.
He told councillors not enough was being done in the short term.
‘‘And while things are not being done, there are people in South Dunedin, elderly people, who are living the final years of their lives.
‘‘They worry and they are concerned, and I don’t feel that they’re getting a fair go.’’
His father was flooded out twice since moving to South Dunedin in the mid-1990s.
The first time was in 2015, which Mr Lucas said had taken a toll.
His father worried a lot.
He worried about whether he would continue to be insured, whether he could afford it and what would happen if there was another flood.
Mr Lucas believed his father, having been through that first experience, did not feel there was going to be another flood because action would have been taken since 2015.
He felt people would find that the systems and infrastructure in place had been lacking and would sort them out.
Then, in 2024, he was flooded out for a second time.
‘‘Even the night before that flood, he still didn’t believe that it could happen again and so wouldn’t leave his dwelling, as his family wished he would.
‘‘And so I went there on the day, and he was on his couch, surrounded by sewage-filled water, saying, ‘I don’t believe this has happened again’.
‘‘That had a severe impact on him.’’
Mr Lucas said his father had moved to South Dunedin from the hill suburbs to live in a low-maintenance dwelling, where he could tend to a small shrub garden, go for walks on the flat and live out his days ‘‘in independent life that he wanted and hoped for’’.
He died in March, aged 95.
‘‘He was a South Dunedin born-and-bred person, and that’s where he felt truly at home.’’
His father was ‘‘to use a water analogy ... not a person who made waves’’.
‘‘He would not have come to talk to you.
‘‘I’m talking on his behalf, after his death.’’
Cr Andrew Simms said he understood Mr Lucas was involved in carrying his father out of the floodwaters in 2015.
Mr Lucas said it was ‘‘a bewildering experience for everybody involved, because we really didn’t know what we were going to do’’.
‘‘I knew the only real solution was to take him to my place, which is on a hill, and is not set up for a person with mobility issues.
‘‘I was frankly quite angry that, as we were being driven through the floodwaters, the nice man from the DCC was saying, ‘it’s not been as bad this time as last time,’ which I felt lacked empathy.’’
The waters were clearly contaminated, he said.
They had wet feet and his car stank a few days later.
He then had to look after his father at his place and rearranged all of his health services to come there too.
Everything was thrown up in the air, Mr Lucas said.
‘‘I was, in fact, probably quite lucky that I’m retired.
‘‘I don’t know what I would have done if I’d had a fulltime job and that had happened.’’
