Every flood season, the same question comes up in towns across the Goulburn Valley and beyond: when the water starts rising, who is actually in charge. The answer is more structured than most people realise, and understanding it can make the difference between a smooth evacuation and a dangerous one.
Victoria runs on what emergency planners call the “control agency” model. It sounds bureaucratic, but it is the backbone of how the state responds to floods, storms and almost every other kind of emergency. This explainer sets out how it actually works on the ground.
What is a “control agency” and why does it matter #
Under Victoria’s emergency management arrangements, one agency is designated the control agency for each type of emergency. For floods and storms, that agency is the Victoria State Emergency Service, commonly known as VICSES. Being the control agency means VICSES is responsible for managing the overall response — coordinating warnings, tasking resources, and directing the operational response to the hazard itself.
Victoria Police, by contrast, is not the control agency in a flood or storm event. Its role sits alongside VICSES rather than above or below it. Police retain responsibility for law and order, traffic management, and — critically — for leading search and rescue operations when someone is reported missing. In practice, the two organisations work side by side, each running its own lane, coordinated through Victoria’s emergency management structure at the state, regional and municipal level.
Warnings: whose voice reaches your phone #
Flood and storm warnings issued through VicEmergency, including watch and act messages and emergency warnings, are issued under VICSES authority as control agency, often drawing on data from the Bureau of Meteorology. Victoria Police does not issue these warnings, but officers are frequently the ones doorknocking streets, closing roads, and reinforcing warning messages face to face in communities where phone reception or internet access can be patchy.
VICSES has said in public messaging that residents in flood-prone regional areas should not wait for a knock on the door before acting on a warning. Community members are consistently urged to register for VicEmergency alerts, monitor ABC local radio, and have a household flood plan in place before a warning is even issued.
Evacuations: who decides, who enforces #
Decisions to recommend or direct an evacuation during a flood are made by VICSES as control agency, in consultation with local councils and other emergency services. Once that decision is made, Victoria Police plays a central role in the practical business of getting people out — staffing checkpoints, managing road closures, and where necessary enforcing directions to leave an area that has been declared unsafe.
This division matters because it shapes how residents should interpret what they see and hear during an emergency. A VICSES volunteer at your door is relaying an evacuation recommendation or warning. A police officer at a roadblock is enforcing a closure that has already been determined by the control agency. Neither is acting independently of the other — the arrangements are designed so the messaging is consistent, even though the uniforms are different.
Search and rescue: where police take the lead #
If someone goes missing during a flood or storm event — swept from a causeway, missing after a vehicle is submerged, or unaccounted for after an evacuation — Victoria Police becomes the lead agency for the search, even though VICSES remains the control agency for the broader flood response. VICSES search and rescue volunteers, along with Victoria Police search and rescue squad members, the Air Wing and other specialist units, are typically tasked to support that police-led search.
Having reported on missing persons cases across regional Victoria for several years, this is one of the areas where confusion is most common. Communities sometimes assume VICSES is running a missing person search because its vehicles and volunteers are visible at the scene. In reality, Victoria Police holds responsibility for search and rescue operations involving a missing person, and any public appeals for information in those cases come from police, not VICSES.
Local councils and the broader network #
Regional council emergency management teams sit alongside VICSES and Victoria Police in this arrangement, typically managing relief centres, coordinating road authority closures on council-controlled roads, and liaising with agencies such as Regional Roads Victoria and local water authorities. Municipal emergency management plans, developed with input from all these agencies, set out relief centre locations and evacuation routes well before flood season arrives.
Community Emergency Risk Management arrangements also draw in Country Fire Authority brigades, particularly where floodwater and storm damage overlap with fallen trees, downed power lines or fire risk from electrical faults. In practice, a single severe storm event in regional Victoria can involve VICSES, Victoria Police, CFA, Ambulance Victoria, council staff and the Bureau of Meteorology all working from the same incident management framework simultaneously.
What this means for residents in flood-prone regional towns #
For people living in towns along the Goulburn, Murray or Ovens river systems, understanding this structure is not an academic exercise. It shapes practical decisions during an emergency: which warnings to act on immediately, who to call if a family member cannot be located, and why a road might remain closed even after rain has stopped falling upstream.
VICSES has repeatedly emphasised that flood recovery timelines depend heavily on catchment behaviour, and that a river can continue rising for days after rain has eased in a given town, particularly in lower reaches of major river systems. Local knowledge, built up over generations in flood-prone communities, remains a valuable resource — but authorities have said residents should treat official warnings as the primary trigger for action rather than past experience of previous flood events, since catchment conditions and rainfall patterns can differ significantly between events.
For First Nations communities along river systems with deep cultural and historical connections to these waterways, local Traditional Owner groups are often engaged by councils and emergency services in planning discussions, particularly where cultural heritage sites or significant places may be affected by flooding or emergency works.
The bottom line on coordination #
The control agency model exists so that in a fast-moving flood or storm event, there is no ambiguity about who is making the operational call on the hazard itself, even while multiple agencies are working the same emergency from different angles. VICSES leads the flood and storm response. Victoria Police leads law enforcement, traffic control and search and rescue. Councils manage relief and local infrastructure. None of these roles are interchangeable, and understanding the difference can help residents work out which official source to trust for which kind of information during an unfolding emergency.
Readers in regional Victoria are encouraged to register for VicEmergency warnings ahead of the flood season and to familiarise themselves with their local council’s emergency management plan, including relief centre locations, well before any warning is issued.
For emergency help, call 000. For SES assistance with flood or storm damage, call VICSES on 132 500. If you have information about a missing person, contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000. For emotional support during or after an emergency, Lifeline is available on 13 11 14 and Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander callers can reach 13YARN on 13 92 76.
