Former mayor alleges council approved a massage business application for a property selling sexual services

Former Port Hedland mayor Camilo Blanco has alleged council approved a home massage business development application for a property used to sell sexual services. At the August 30 ordinary council meeting, the council unanimously approved a home business massage service development application for a property in South Hedland. Mr Blanco’s allegations came during the public question time at the Town of Port Hedland’s September 27 ordinary council meeting. During the meeting, Mr Blanco said a resident had shown him text messages after the August meeting that allegedly showed the property was being used to sell sexual services. “So he sent me the paperwork, and the correspondence between the Town and himself,” he said. “And I also have some text messages, because I still didn’t believe him right, confirming that it is in fact a brothel.” The development application was advertised to seven neighbouring properties and received one objection during community consultation. A table in the August council meeting minutes showed a summary of the resident’s objections to the application which included their allegation an illegal business was already operating from the premises. In the table, the officer’s recommendation stated the allegations were “a question of monitoring and enforcement, not a relevant planning consideration.” In public question time at the September council meeting, Mr Blanco said the resident emailed alleged evidence to the Town. “The complaint sent by email showed the premises as being used as a brothel. The information is omitted from the officer’s recommendation,” he said. “So what I want to know is, why the planning department presented this item to the council with a recommendation of planning approval when brothels are clearly an X use in a residential area, X use means prohibited.” The Town of Port Hedland has pushed back against the allegations and director of regulatory services Craig Watts said councillors had been informed of the resident’s objection. “Any suggestion that elected members or members of the community are being misled is incorrect,” he said. “The public documents provided to elected members to inform decision-making on the establishment of a home business clearly stated an objection had been received. “This is noted on page 64 of the public agenda with a summary of the objection included.” Mr Watts said the resident’s documents were not provided because they had elected to remain anonymous in their objection. “It was also noted in the report: ‘The objector has requested to remain anonymous. For this reason, the objection documents are not included in or attached to this report. “Elected members were provided with further details around the objection through confidential briefings to ensure the anonymity of the objector was protected.” Mr Watts said an inspection of the property was carried out by the Town. “As per the public agenda, the approval conditions also clearly state the home business must not be used for the provision of sexual services as defined under the Prostitution Act 2000,” he said. “The Town takes its commitment to ensuring community safety and regulatory compliance seriously. As such, inspections of home businesses are a matter of normal practice and have been carried out in this instance.” The inspection of the property was conducted on July 11 and further inspections and interviews were done on August 9. During the September meeting, Mr Blanco said he thought the item would be revoked given the information he had presented to a council member. “Now this does not comply with the planning codes, this is a clear indication that staff are misleading the council and community,” Mr Blanco said. “I would have thought the item would have been revoked tonight because a few days after the meeting the CEO was told by a council member who I gave this info to.”