Walter Hall told the Courier he recently returned from an extended overseas holiday and was ‘furious’ to discover that the homeless people who had been sleeping in their cars in the car park opposite the CBH grain terminal on Rockingham Beach Road had gone and in their place were ‘no camping’ signs.
Cr Sammels said the signs had only been installed in the ‘last week or so’ and had been placed ‘specifically to deter people from camping in this area’.
But Mr Hall believes they deliberately target the dozen or so homeless people who used the car park as an overnight shelter where they slept in their vehicles.
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READ NOW‘All of these (homeless) people were employed and by no means on the bones of their arse,’ Mr Hall stressed.
‘I walk my dog past the car park and came in contact with them and offered them help but they said they didn’t require help as they all had jobs; they just couldn’t afford rent so were sleeping in their cars.
‘They were using the car park because it’s a quiet and sheltered area and you wouldn’t have known they were even there.’
But what has really got Mr Hall’s goat is the lack of similar signage at other car parks along Rockingham Beach Road.
‘There are other car parks in closer proximity (to the foreshore) without signs, so is this where they want these people to camp?’ he said.
‘If they are going to put them in one car park they have to put them in all the car parks.’
He said he hoped Cr Sammels would be receptive to a meeting so he could ask why the signs were put up and discuss the broader issue of homelessness in the Rockingham area.
‘Once I start something I see it through to the end,’ he said.