A Melbourne council has agreed to install CCTV cameras in a crime hot spot after radio star Kate Langbroek slammed them for being complacent.
The 52-year-old co-host of the ‘Hughesy and Kate’ show sent an email to City of Port Phillip council this week after she was assaulted by an intruder trying to break into her St Kilda home in early March.
‘I’m frankly astounded at the disrespect, loose regard for the truth and patronising tone from certain councillors,’ she wrote.
‘Those who become complacent about their positions will soon forfeit them.’
A Melbourne council has agreed to install CCTV cameras in a crime hot spot after radio star Kate Langbroek (pictured with a bruise from an intruder) slammed them for being complacent
Dangerous laneways, like this one in St Kilda, will have CCTV cameras installed after council voted to accept funding from the state government
After that email was published by her local Bayside Leader newspaper, councillors voted on Wednesday night to accept a state government funding offer to install closed-circuit TV cameras on Grey and Little Grey streets in St Kilda.
The laneways are covered in graffiti and Daily Mail Australia took images of syringes on the pavement near the closed Gatwick – a notorious halfway house dubbed the ‘Hell Hotel’.
Kate Langbroek, who co-hosts a nationally syndicated Hit radio network show with comedian Dave Hughes, had accused the council of prizing ‘violence and mayhem more than order and beauty’.
While the council has agreed to install CCTV cameras, it is yet to give a time frame for when that will happen or confirm how much funding it will receive from the Victorian government.
After that email was published, councillors voted on Wednesday night to accept a state government funding offer to install closed-circuit TV cameras on Grey and Little Grey streets
It resolved to accept the funding offer on the proviso the state government paid for ‘ the full infrastructure, planning, purchase, project management, operating and installation costs’
It resolved to accept the funding offer on the proviso the state government paid for ‘the full infrastructure, planning, purchase, project management, operating and installation costs of the additional CCTV system’.
The council also wants the CCTV cameras to be easily relocatable to nearby Fitzroy Street after a trial.
The council also voted, 7 to 2, to review the rollout of CCTV cameras in March next year.
However the mayor, Bernadene Voss, refuted a suggestion the council had voted against installing CCTV cameras at a previous meeting on March 21.
‘We have heard loud and clear from our community there that they don’t feel safe and want us to take this step as they believe it will help them once again fully enjoy their much-loved streets,’ she said.
Last month, Langbroek sustained severe bruises when a ‘crazed’ person tried to break into her family home on a Friday evening.
She claimed that she and her husband had just arrived back at their St Kilda home when a man attempted to force his way into her babysitter’s car, before being involved in a scuffle and trying to break into their house, which is home to her four young children, aged between eight and 12.