A Ballarat man has spoken out about the danger posed by Ballarat’s GovHub building.
Yesterday’s shutdown of the building has come as no surprise to the local, who claims he was in the firing line of building debris at the beginning of August.
After the building closed on Wednesday, the Department of Treasury and Finance, which manages the building, released a statement.
“The Ballarat GovHub is closed today (23 November) to undertake a full assessment of the building’s façade and perform maintenance work following strong winds this week.
The GovHub has been closed as a precautionary measure to ensure the safety of staff and visitors while work is underway.”
A decision about the re-opening of the GovHub will be made once the assessment has been completed and an update will be provided to staff and the community.”
A local man, who has asked to remain anonymous, alleges a piece of the building flew off and hit his car on a windy day on August 2nd, and when he tried to report it he was allegedly brushed off.
“No one (inside GovHub) accepted responsibility or took my personal details to do a follow up for the damage that was caused to my car, which I was out of pocket with. I just want someone from the GovHub building or whoever’s in charge to contact me.”
He says that he has photographic proof of the material, and it could have been a lot worse.
“It flew across the road like a bullet…I thought to myself that if my car wasn’t there and somebody had been walking past they could’ve potentially been impaled because it was about 3 or 4 foot, and it was shaped like an arrow by the time it was twisted off the building.”
Update: response on the August 2nd incident from the Department of Treasury and Finance:
“The department has investigated the matter and has not received any further information or a claim for damages since the initial conversation at the time of the alleged incident.”
