THE Fire Danger Period started on Monday across Victoria’s southeast including the Mornington Peninsula and Frankston regions, and French Island in Western Port. The Country Fire Authority’s Trevor Owen said it would be introduced across all municipalities in the CFA’s South East Region because of current conditions. FDPs are based on local conditions and take into account fuel moisture, fuel loads, grassland curing, weather and rainfall. Mr Owen said vegetation was already very dry across the southeast and early indicators were pointing to “a long and challenging fire season ahead”. The declaration in the southeast follows the Bureau of Meteorology’s…
Author: Mike Hast
A PROPOSAL to move drug replacement dispensing from pharmacies near Frankston station to a dedicated centre at Frankston Hospital has received little support from the two major political parties, says lobby group Frankston Community Coalition. The group – formed in January to pressure politicians for a better deal for the city in the run-up to the November state election – says Labor’s Paul Edbrooke and the Liberal Party’s Sean Armistead have shown little interest in this and other community coalition proposals. More than 14,000 Victorians are receiving Opioid Replacement Therapy (ORT) in an effort to limit the harm of addiction…
SEAN Armistead has been selected by the Liberal Party to take on independent MP Geoff Shaw and Labor’s Helen Constas in the crucial seat of Frankston at the November state election. Mr Armistead, 37, a manager at Crown casino, won in the first ballot at the Frankston preselection convention held at Frankston Arts Centre on Monday night last week, knocking off rivals Darrel Taylor, Frankston’s mayor, and Detective Senior Sergeant Michael Lamb, head of the Mornington Peninsula’s crime investigation units. Mr Armistead’s win has shocked many Liberals, who thought Cr Taylor was the frontrunner because of his higher profile…
THE man who blew the whistle on the CFA’s Fiskville training centre scandal was sent off with full honours last month at a private funeral service at St Jude’s Church in Langwarrin and a memorial service at Langwarrin fire station. Brian Potter, 70, was the CFA’s chief between 1985 and his retirement in late 1991. He spoke out for fair treatment of firefighters suffering from cancers related to their work, especially those who had died young after being exposed to cancer-causing chemicals at Fiskville in the 1970s and 1980s. Dozens of cancer cases were linked to the use of chemicals…
FRANKSTON has waited nearly three decades for a safer, more functional train station precinct, says lobby group Frankston Community Coalition. The group – formed in January to pressure politicians for a better deal for the city in the run-up to the November state election – says politicians have made promises not kept, state government bureaucrats have wasted millions of dollars on the precinct, and all three levels of government have been gripped by inertia. Community coalition spokesman Ken Rowe, former principal of Frankston High School and a member of Friends of Frankston Station, said the station precinct had been neglected…