By Violet Li
Two sacked Casey councillors are going head to head in River Gum Ward in next month’s Casey Council election.
Damien Rosario and Wayne Smith used to be councillors in the same ward until the council was dismissed in the midst of an IBAC anti-corruption inquiry in 2020.
Former deputy mayor Rosario, who had no adverse findings against him, said it was “not an easy decision” to come back into the election race.
A Hampton Park resident, an IT educator, and a member of the Liberal party, he represented the same ward for seven and a half years.
“I only just made the decision to run, so this is not an easy decision,” Mr Rosario said.
“Because of all of the issues with the IBAC, it opens me up to criticisms, even though I’ve been cleared by IBAC.
“People paint you with the same brush regardless of and they don’t look at the details either. Anyone who follows my Facebook or knows me in the community sees me out there will know what I’m all about.
“I have been active, and people have said, oh, you know, he’s just suddenly become active. I haven’t. If you look back, I have never stopped being active,” Mr Rosario said.
“I just kept a bit of a low profile for the first couple of years while the IBAC investigation was on, so I could still help groups, but their groups were not judged, because I was participating, supporting, or volunteering for them. Because until the investigation is done, there is a cloud that hangs over everyone’s head.
“So, if you’re ever wondering why people are saying, why am I so active now? It’s not that. I was just waiting for the right time to be able to get back into educating our community on what’s happening around us.”
Mr Rosario said the ultimate drive for him to step forward this time was his eagerness to help his community.
“When I was on council, I saw connections that groups that were working in isolation could be working together to benefit the community,” he said.
“I made it my mission in the last four and a half years since leaving council to continue that work as a volunteer in the community.
“What’s really driving me is that ability to get back in the council to use that to help unite a community.”
Mr Rosario pointed out that his primary focus in running for a councillor was not for the sake of being a councillor.
He said it was not the title itself that attracted him, but the opportunities to devote himself to the community.
“A resident said to me the other day that you’ve been doing the role of a councillor without actually being a councillor, without actually having any of the resources or any of the title. You were just doing it to help people,” he said.
“I guess that for me was the driver to say, look, maybe I still have something to contribute.
“That’s why that’s the reason why I decided to do this.”
Speaking of running against his former colleague Wayne Smith, Mr Rosario said: “It is what it is.”
Former mayor and ALP member Wayne Smith also nominated to stand for River Gum Ward in the coming Casey Council election, saying he has been “cleared of the issues of IBAC”.
The investigation found that he failed to declare a conflict of interest involving developer John Woodman.
Mr Smith highlighted he was the only Justice of the Peace in his community during Covid.
“They would not allow me to be a JP (and a Bail Justice) if the issues of IBAC were of concern to them. I know at the time they looked at the IBAC findings. I was interviewed, and there were no findings,” he said.
“I was cleared to be able to continue in that role.
“I’m disappointed about what happened, and, yes, I probably should have known stuff, but there was nothing that they were going to be able to follow through with charges or anything, and IBAC has said that the investigation in relation to me is well and truly closed, and there are no plans, intentions to do any more,” Mr Smith said.
“Certainly no charges in the air.
“From that day, I continued my life in the community.”
As his life continued, Mr Smith believed he had got a lot more to do and he was in his prime doing lots of things.
“I’m keen to get back in and get some of those projects and new ones up and running because the community has suffered in the last four and a half years without a doubt,” he said.
“My vision is to get River Gum back on the map because at the moment, it’s probably no worse off than any other ward, but after the administrators, no ward was really singled out and looked after.
“You only have to drive around to see how dirty and unkempt it is in terms of council responsibilities on the side to the roads, in parks and gardens.
“And in my time off council, I’ve been very active in reporting that sort of stuff. But obviously, I had no power to do anything about it, but I continued to do that.”
Speaking of running against his former colleague Damien Rosario, Mr Smith said neither of them would have wanted to play against each other.
“I think we worked well together when we were on a two-person ward. I will only stand in that ward because I strongly believe in standing in the area that I live in,” he said.
“I’ve lived in that area for a long, long time, and I’ve raised my family in that area. I wasn’t prepared to go to another ward to sort of avoid that. I hope we can work together and if he gets up, I’ll certainly contact him regularly to get things done, and I would expect him to do the same.
“I think it’ll be a friendly rivalry.
“I’m disappointed that we’ve been put in this position to do it, but I understand why he’s doing it because he wants to be in that role, and I’m doing it for the same reason. It’s just a shame that we didn’t have two-member awards again.
“Because, in some wards, it didn’t work, but in River Gum, it worked. It absolutely worked.”
Mr Smith is a Lynbrook resident and a secondary school teacher.
Also running in River Gum is previous councillor Lynette Pereira, who served from 2008 to 2012.
“[The Ward] has been totally ignored, Hampton Park is the biggest suburbs and the shops are an absolute mess,” she said.
“The sense of community is lost, there is so much money that needs to be put back into this ward, we’ve been so neglected.”
She criticised the previous councillors – those who were dismissed in 2020 amid an IBAC investigation – adding that “they didn’t actually pay attention to what they should have been doing”.
“And that’s keeping our rates down, making sure the ward’s getting its money and attention is being paid.”
