Parking plea

By Lia Bichel
A NOBLE Park woman is calling on the Greater Dandenong Council and Parkmore Shopping Centre to provide more security in the car park.
Debra Rossi said she wants more security to prevent young people from loitering and to monitor non-disabled people using the disabled parking bays.
The 53-year-old, who suffers from osteoarthritis and often has trouble walking, said the car parks needed to be patrolled full-time by two security guards on either side of the centre.
“You get people parking without any stickers, or they just put stickers up when they are parking. That’s not good enough. They are supposed to display it on their windscreen. It’s a problem,” she said.
“There are other problems down there as well. There are young kids on school holidays hitting trolleys against cars, asking people for money. There is stealing going on down there. It’s getting dangerous in the car park.”
Ms Rossi said she had reported her concerns to the council but was not satisfied with their response.
Parkmore Shopping Centre operations manager Rachel Blair said the comfort and safety of staff and customers was a priority.
“We have a comprehensive and pro-active security program that incorporates regular patrols by our security team and centre bans in place for those caught behaving inappropriately,” she said.
“We have worked closely with local police to positively impact anti-social behaviour and are seeing encouraging results from our efforts in this area.”
She said parking regulations were enforced by the Greater Dandenong Council and the local police.
The councils development services director Mal Baker said Parkmore Shopping Centre had contracted the enforcement of road rules within the car park to the council.
“Council officers regularly patrol the car park, including the disabled bays, to ensure compliance. Sixty-six infringements have been issued in the last nine months.
“Holders of Disabled Permits are able to park for twice the permitted time in normal parking bays should the disabled bays be unavailable. This does not excuse illegal parking in disabled bays for which the council will continue to patrol and issue infringements,” he said.
“The current infringement penalty for illegal use of a disabled bay is $117.”