By GEORGIA WESTGARTH
HAVING battled the events of the 2008 Brookland Greens gas-leak which devastated Cranbourne homeowners, Leanne Petrides from Cranbourne Information and Support Service (CISS) is familiar with the estate that can’t escape the spotlight.
Now making headlines for their active protest against state share housing provisions, which the City of Casey is fighting to amend for the second time, Brookland Greens residents have again ignited a complex planning issue.
One that, Cranbourne CISS Executive Officer, Ms Petrides, sees as a discussion worth having.
“We see many people who are living in private rentals who can’t afford the rent as well as those struggling to pay their mortgage and we try to help prevent those people from going into rooming houses,” she said.
Ms Petrides, who is at the coalface of Casey homelessness every day, said accommodation such as rooming houses was all about “placement”.
“I think there’s a lack of affordable housing in Casey and its pushing people towards homelessness, illegal and registered rooming houses,” she said.
“In my view, good quality shared houses need an appropriate amount of bathrooms or one in each room and need to be close to public transport, open space and shopping amenities, as you can’t be sure the occupants own cars.
“However, Casey services are quite spread out, so often occupants will own cars and these houses need to have enough off street parking.”
With 17 years’ experience at CISS, Ms Petrides said the Salvos and Launch Housing rooming house models, were the best she had seen.
“They incorporate support for people with drop in case workers, because it’s not just a housing issue.
“For many people, they have drug or alcohol addictions or mental health problems which have brought them into this situation and isolated them from family and community,” she said.
At a recent community forum, Brookland Greens residents expressed these concerns to Casey council officers, saying they fear a share house would result in an influx in local crime.
But Ms Petrides said no-one can presume that would be the case.
“I don’t know that we can assume that every homeless person is a criminal, many of them are simply disadvantaged and often families that need support to lift themselves up.”
However, Ms Petrides said that such houses could be targeted at parents with children, family violence victims and parolees.
“Unfortunately as much as we don’t want to admit it, poverty exists in our streets and we need to be looking at options for people who aren’t as fortunate, and that includes housing,” she said.
Ms Petrides said the wider community needed to remember that many of their neighbours might be just one or two pay cheques away from taking up residence in a rooming house.
“In Casey, people hang on by the skin of their teeth, it’s a budget treadmill, people only need to get sick or have an accident and lose their job and find themselves on a waiting list for a rooming house,” she said.
“I would be surprised if any property in Casey up for rent would be classified as affordable, it’s rare.”
Do you know an appropriate location for a rooming/share house in Casey?
