When a home is unsafe

IF there is one place where you deserve to feel safe, it’s in your own home.

Unfortunately, the notion of home as a sanctuary is impossible for some locals who have shared their struggles with threatening and dangerous neighbours in recent months.

Yesterday, one local woman came forward with her story of years of feeling threatened and intimidated by her neighbour, a public housing tenant.

Her decision to share her story with the media was not made lightly — she said she felt she had no other option after years of appealing to the Department of Health and Human Services with little result.

Coincidently, the day her story was published, another local, Belmont man Jason Caudullo, was jailed after admitting to stalking and harassing his neighbours, including a Jewish man who was a repeated victim of anti-Semitic behaviour.

Caudullo’s actions prompted at least six locals to take out intervention orders against him in a matter of months. He was arrested after a Geelong Advertiser story that featured damning comments from the State Opposition was published in March.

Sometimes there can be coincidences in news reporting. But to hear several horror stories in a matter of days, shows there is an issue that can’t simply be ignored.

The common link in these stories was the involvement of public housing tenants and the frustration expressed by victims at how long it took for them to see any action.

It shouldn’t take the involvement of the media for people to get some action from the State Government in regard to feeling safe in their own home.

The state Housing Minister will reportedly now review the plight of the local woman in yesterday’s story. But the system should be able to protect people without the interference of state ministers.

And perhaps she could have been spared four years of angst if someone had decided to act sooner.