Cara Bellofiore pictured with her sister Laura, who requires respite care.By Rebecca Fraser
A BERWICK teenager has spoken of the desperate shortage of respite facilities in Casey for families with disabled children.
The comments follow news that two nearby respite centres will become adultonly facilities from 1 November under a Department of Human Services’ initiative.
Cara Bellofiore, 17, said her family was now running out of options and would struggle to find a respite facility for her intellectually and physically disabled sister.
Laura, 14, was born with sotos syndrome, that heavily impedes her mental and physical capacity.
Ms Bellofiore said Laura, who attends the Dandenong Valley Special School, goes to a DHS operated respite facility in Hampton Park and to a private respite centre in Camms Road, Cranbourne.
“We have been receiving facilitybased respite one weekend a month if we are lucky sometimes we even take Laura to the DHS respite facility in Dingley if we cannot get in anywhere else,” Ms Bellofiore said.
“We are also worried that from November many families will be trying to get into the private facility in Cranbourne and it will be even harder to get in.”
Ms Bellofiore said they had received a letter from Southern Metropolitan Disability Services two months ago telling them that the two respite facilities would only care for people aged 18 years and over from November.
“From this time the only department house available to my family will be in Frankston,” she said.
“They said there will still be a few spots for people aged 16 and over but that still means we will have to wait for two years.
“They have not thought this plan through and we cannot believe that this is happening.”
The Year 12 student at St Francis Xavier in Beaconsfield said respite provided families and carers with a break.
“It’s the chance for my family to go out and spend time together and go to a restaurant or have some quiet time,” she said.
“Laura loves going to respite as she makes friends and has her buddies and carers.
“It is a two way street and this change means that families, carers and those that go to respite will all miss out,” she said.
Ms Bellofiore is also a young carer and said she was starting to realise what her parents had been struggling with for many years, not just the care of a special child but also having to fight for every single service they accessed.
“How can a local, state and federal government not have the infrastructure to provide services for these vulnerable families in this area?” she asked.
Ms Bellofiore said her parents, Lina and Paul, who also have another daughter, worked fulltime but sometimes found it hard to earn an income as well as look after Laura.
She said the family had recently had a meeting with a member of the Department of Human Services but their problems were far from solved.
“We understand that other services will be offered to us but we find weekend respite works the best for us as a family,” she said.
“Another problem is that at the moment the school bus picks up the kids from school and takes them to respite and picks them up on Monday morning for school.
“This won’t happen when the changes come in because the school buses are not zoned to Frankston,” he said.
A spokesperson for the Department of Human Services said they had reconfigured some of their facilities to ensure that there were childrenonly facilities.
“There will not be a reduction in places and there will be a host of other services that will be available to the family.
“We will be working closely with the family to ensure that their needs are met,” she said.
