Community
26 March, 2025
Do you need your smoke alarm battery changed?
ROTARY Club of Cobden members are offering to change the batteries of smoke alarms for members of the community in Cobden and district who may be unable to do so themselves.
Next Saturday, April 5, members will unite to change the smoke alarm batteries of residents for just $3.
Past president Mark Towner said the initiative has been running since 2011.
“This will be the 14th running, we may have missed one year during COVID-19 lockdowns but I think we did end up doing it, we just did it when the lockdowns opened up,” he said.
“We normally do it around the time of the end of daylight savings, so it’s usually in April when the time changes, which is when people are encouraged to change their smoke detector batteries.
“The genesis of it was a program operating in Hamilton that I came across and we just thought, there’s an ageing population in Cobden and there’s probably a lot of people there that have got smoke detectors that the batteries haven’t been changed for a long time, and that turned out to be the case.”
Mr Towner said the program was well-prescribed each year and a point of pride for Rotary members to help residents who need it most.
“It’s a great little program organised by Rhonda McGauchie, the wife of one of our Rotarians, Bruce McGauchie,” he said.
“She does all the organising in the background, which is great.
“We usually have two crews of two people that go around the town on that Saturday morning and replace anywhere from 30-to-50 batteries for people that can’t otherwise do it themselves and certainly can’t do it safely.
“A lot of people shouldn’t be going up and down ladders and that sort of stuff.”
Mr Towner said it was a vital time for smoke alarms to be operational as winter approaches, which was further heightened by members often finding smoke alarms which had run flat or were otherwise not operational.
“It’s a really simple thing to do as we’re coming into winter, so with heating to run having a working smoke detector is important,” he said.
“We change the battery, give it a test, make sure it’s working, and we can be pretty comfortable that for the next 12 months it’s going to be a working detector.
“House fires happen and from time to time people don’t come out of that very well.
“I think everyone would prefer to be woken up in the middle of the night by a smoke detector and find out it’s just they left the window open and the neighbour next door is burning a whole bunch of rubbish, and that happens – I’d rather that than somebody sleep through a fire.”
To book in to have your smoke alarm batteries changed on Saturday, April 5 contact Rhonda McGauchie on 0408 339 363.
“We’ll also have some signup sheets – one at Nell’s café and the other one will be at the post office,” Mr Towner said.
“People can sign up their details and Rhonda will get in touch with them and set up a time that suits them.
“It’s just a couple hours of volunteer work, but it’s a good feeling at the end of it.
“We meet some nice people, and it’s a really simple thing but it can be impactful.”
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