By Lia Bichel
FEARS are rife among Narre Warren North residents who are opposed to a mental health service in Memorial Drive.
The Narre Warren North Community Association has voiced its concerns about the service, amid media reports of a series of alleged incidents in mental health facilities.
The alleged events include a rape cover-up by Eastern Health employees, a sexual assault in a mental health ward in St Vincent’s Hospital in Fitzroy, and a psychiatric nurse who was employed by Southern Health to work with mentally ill patients after stalking and harassing a female patient.
But Southern Health, which is behind the Narre Warren North facility, said local residents had nothing to fear.
The proposed Prevention and Recovery Care Services (PARCS) will be designed as a house with 10 bedrooms with no external signage which is meant to blend in with the neighbourhood.
It will be staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with trained clinicians and mental health recovery workers.
Spokesperson for Southern Health Suzana Talevski said PARCS were places where people with mental illness who were too unwell to be at home, but not so unwell that they needed to go to hospital, could receive treatment and care for a short period of time.
Narre Warren North Community Association President Anthony Volpi said this was not a case of “not in my backyard.”
He said the association and local residents believed it was of great importance to assist the recovery of mental health disorders but thought Memorial Drive was not the correct location for the facility.
“We have very grave concerns about the level of security in these facilities and the safety of local residents, considering the publicity (in The Age) of assault and a sexual abuse which was covered up. Having three or four staff in a big facility is not enough,” Mr Volpi said.
“There are pensioners two doors down from where this facility will be and there are school children and teenagers who catch the bus across the road. We have some very worried parents.”
But Ms Talevski said all residents of the PARCS would have been assessed by mental health professionals as being suitable for care in the PARCS environment prior to being accommodated there.
“They will receive regular and ongoing assessment by clinicians during their stay,” she said.
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