Houses in shed fight

A DISPUTE is brewing between several Neighbourhood Houses in the City of Casey over the construction of a large shed at Oakgrove Community Centre (OCC).
The Narre Warren South centre has been trying to get the council’s approval and funding for the shed to be built next to the existing building for several months.
However, this attempt failed at last week’s council meeting when a majority of councillors rejected the proposal.
Adding fuel to the fire was a letter sent from Narre Community Learning Centre (NCLC) asking that OCC follow the process put in place for community centres to obtain funding.
Councillor Michael Farley has led the unsuccessful push for the construction of the shed, which now looks to have little chance of proceeding before the end of the year.
Cr Farley said he was disappointed with the councillors who didn’t accept his original notice of motion that requested more than $35,000 to be spent on the shed.
An alternative notice of motion, put up by Cr Janet Halsall, asking for a report on the establishment of the shed to come back to the council in September was carried.
“I thought it was a bit of a cop out.
“Community centres never fight amongst each other publicly but here we have community centres yelling and screaming about what is happening at OCC,” Cr Farley said.
He said the shed was desperately needed to cater for a growing population in Narre Warren South.
“We are going to get some terrible social problems if we don’t address this issue and this is what a shed will do,” he said.