About 600 St Kilda residents and traders including cafe owner Katherine Wilson say the suburb's main streets are in "crisis".Credit:Simon Schluter
The petition says the situation,which has gradually worsened since 2016,reached tipping point with the death of a rough sleeper on the busy Fitzroy Street precinct on Friday,October 11.
It suggests a six-month trial of positioning two trained security guards on Fitzroy,Acland and Carlisle streets to prevent incidents such as last Friday,when Simon Baric,73,was hospitalised with a fractured skull after attempting to protect his son's car and motor scooter from two men outside his St Kilda home.
Katherine Wilson has owned Off The Rails cafe on Fitzroy Street for three years. She said she witnessed drug taking,drug dealing and violence as a"daily occurrence",and she believes they are a major reason behind growing store vacancy rates in St Kilda.
"I’ve been threatened,physically attacked. I’ve had men pretend to shoot me with a shotgun,threaten to come back and slit my throat,spit on my windows,urinate or defecate on my shop,"she said.
"Nobody wants to gentrify the whole area,everyone knows the colourfulness that is St Kilda,but when their lives are affected by violence,whether it be verbal or physical,that’s where you draw the line."
Andrew Bond,an independent councillor who is a member of the Liberal Party,toldThe Agethe council should step in to provide support with increased security where the state government and police – whom he said were severely under-resourced – were unable to.