We’re drained!

By Sarah Schwager
TOORADIN’S open drains are a death trap for young children, according to fed-up locals.
Angry residents say they are sick and tired of continually being ignored by Casey Council.
They say drains in front of their homes are left open and stagnant – a breeding ground for mosquitoes and a death trap for young children.
For more than 20 years they have asked the council to fill the drains, as they are not draining, but so far their calls have gone unanswered.
Finally, on Tuesday night a petition was tabled asking that a report come back to the next council meeting outlining the status of drainage works proposed for the open drains in Harewood Street, Tooradin.
The council moved a motion that the petition, put forward by Balla Balla Ward councillor Colin Butler, be received and that the report give residents a timeframe for the implementation and the possibility of completing the works themselves under the supervision of council officers.
Tooradin’s Lea Barwick said each year the drains got wider and wider while the road seemed to be falling away.
“It is unhealthy and mosquito ridden,” she said.
“There are 20 kids in the street and they are all little. They could easily drown.”
The three-metre wide, 1.4-metre deep drains go all the way along Harewood Street, in some spots on both sides of the street.
Mick Allman said anything over 300 centimetres deep should have a fence around it. He said that if it were a swimming pool or pond in the backyard it would be fenced.
Another Harewood Street resident, Trish Chandler, said Tooradin people were paying the same rates as people in Beaconsfield and Berwick and yet they had no drains, sealed roads or internet service.
“The only sting I’m getting out of Tooradin is not the mozzies, it’s the City of Casey,” Ms Chandler said.
Carol McGrath said she had got a quote of $2000 to fill the drain outside her home, which would equate to about $18,000 for the street.
But she said the council could not guarantee it would not rip up the work when it sorted out the drainage system.
Ms McGrath said just before Christmas last year, council contractors doing work in the drains said they were the worst they had ever seen. Another contractor got sick after cleaning the drains out.
“What do we do when a kid drowns,” she said.
While residents were showing the News the drains, Cr Butler happened to be driving by.
By that time most of the street had come down to share their frustrations.
Cr Butler stopped and told irate residents when they confronted him about the issue that he would do everything in his power to get the open drains sorted out.
“I don’t disagree with you,” he said. “But it is up to council not me to make that decision.”
He said he would happily put forward a petition and letter signed by the residents to the council.
Council officers will also need to provide some measures in the report to help make the street safer for toddlers.
Councillor Mick Morland said he was very happy to support the residents of Tooradin as the open drains were a safety hazard and should be looked at urgently.
City of Casey manager engineering and environmental services David Richardson said council officers would report back at the next council meeting in Cranbourne in a fortnight with a response to the petition on what had to be done to improve the drains.