Perth Voice Interactive

FOR the first time owners of vacant blocks in Vincent were charged double rates this year.

Fed up with empty lots plaguing the city like broken teeth, mayor John Carey proposed the plan to encourage landowners to do something constructive with their land.

“There is a cost to the community,” he says. “Vacant blocks can be unsightly, unkempt, and it’s demoralising to a town centre.”

Several attract vandals and homeless people: in January police found a meth lab had been set up in a power substation on a vacant Carr Street block.

Mr Carey acknowledges the extra rates are only a slight sting to wealthy captains of industry sitting on vast tracts of land but he still hopes “it is a slight disincentive”.

It’ll apply to any land sitting vacant at the time of the rates assessment.

by DAVID BELL

The owner of a Beaufort Street convenience and smoking accessories store is feeling the heat from some local reaction.

Since opening Lucky 9 and Cloud 9 under one roof on May 1, the owner, who did not want his name used, says he’s had visits from the WA police, WA health department and Vincent city council.

“This one old lady keeps phoning everyone up and saying that we’re selling drugs,” he told the Perth Voice. “It’s absolute rubbish, all we sell is legal smoke accessories in the Cloud 9 area of the store.

“She came in and racially abused me, it’s disgusting. I’m open and non-discriminatory.

“I painted the front of my store with a rainbow in support of gay people—that was a deliberate statement.”

The owner says the only way he and his partners could afford the rent was to have the two stores under one roof.

He claims to have spent $450,000 on fitting out the shop, which includes a convenience store, café and ornate flower shed. “Under advice from the health department we blocked off the Cloud 9 area of the shop and put up an over-18s sign,” he says.

“The bongs are all in glass cabinets so you can’t see much from the convenience store.

“I spent a fortune setting up a beautiful flower shed at the back—the locals love it.”

But another local resident who has not spoken to the owner says it is disgraceful the council allowed Cloud 9 to open.

“Do they not care about our youth or the reputation of our area,” she wrote to the Perth Voice. “To me it is unconscionable to allow such a business to operate.”

The store owner, 32, says he was born in Australia and isn’t judgemental.

“I don’t judge people who come into the Cloud 9 store.

“There are three sex shops and a tobacco store down the road, so [the focus] on our place is bizarre.

“I’m starting to feel a bit persecuted—we’ve spent a lot of my money opening this business and really want to make it work.

“The rents are so high—we had to try something a bit different.”

by STEPHEN POLLOCK

LANDOWNERS in Vincent face a relatively mild 3.62 per cent rates increase this year.

Mayor John Carey says “we’ve got the lowest rates rise in seven years”.

Last year’s clocked in at 3.92 per cent, and before that it hovered in the mid-fours.

The milder increase can be put down to cash coming through from the sale of Tamala Park land, the end of pricey works at Beatty Park, and savings from a ban on councillor travel and a big drop in donations to charities and organisations.

Parking fees will shoot up 10 cents an hour, having been frozen for two years.

Councillors’ requests in the budget include Cr Ros Harley wanting $6000 to help Manna Inc continue feeding the homeless, Emma Cole requesting $5000 to pull down the fence to free the Leederville skate park, and Mr Carey’s request to put aside $25,000 to continue the streets art festival.

The mayor says the budget has been framed on the assumption the council will be “merged” with Perth mid next year but he “still hopes and prays that it falls over”.

The draft budget will go out for 14 days’ advertising before being set in stone.

by DAVID BELL

FESTA della Repubblica is the Italian national holiday, making June 2 the most important day on the country’s calendar.

It happily ties in with WA Day, ensuring celebrations for this year’s Italian Festival in Perth are enjoyed by many over the long weekend.

The day marks the historic vote in 1946 when post-facsism and post-war Italians flocked to the polls to reject the Savoy monarchy and become a republic.

In Rome a huge military parade marks the day, but things are a little more relaxed in laid-back Perth: May 24 kicks off a week of more genteel celebrations, organised by the Italo-Australian Welfare and Cultural Centre, in North Perth.

The aim is to showcase all things Italian to the wider community, president Enzo Sirna says.

“And the important contribution Italians have made to our diverse community. They have enriched our society.”

On the first night there’s a dinner dance at the Italian Club, with Tony Pantano, Nick Agostino and Friends, and a couple of Italian film nights and a bridge competition follows.

Wednesday May 28 is the long-anticipated announcement of the winners of the la competizione dolciaria (the sweets competition), and to find out whose home-made vino is the best—not to mention presentation of the Italian community awards.

A dignified Mass celebrating the foundation of the Italian republic at St Brigid’s church marks the beginning of the end of the week’s celebrations.

But when the sun goes down, the ball gowns will come out rivalling the stars for glitter as Italian guys and gals frock up for the Italian National gala ball.  

THE four Lenzarini brothers arrived in Australia with next to nothing in their pockets but a determination to make something of themselves.

Leaving behind the lush green mountainous region of their home in the province of  Lucca, Garfagnana in Tuscany, the flat brown harshness of WA in the 1950s was confronting to say the least.

Struggling with language and homesickness Narciso, Carlo, Stefano and Florindo worked in a variety of jobs, including at an orchard in Karagullen.

When Florindo became assistant chef at a restaurant, the brothers were inspired by his passionate urgings to open The Romany in Northbridge in 1958.

Now the oldest Italian eatery in Perth, The Romany is still going strong after more than 60 years, although no longer owned by the family.

Meat and three veg (usually boiled and tasteless) had been standard fare for anglicised Aussies in the 1950s and ‘60s and garlic was looked on with such deep suspicion that “garlic muncher” was used perjoratively to describe Italians (and Frenchmen). Even pasta was deemed too exotic for the xenophobic tastes of the time.

Very few shops stocked staples dear to the heart of lovers of Italian food, so the brothers were driven to make their own.

Demand became so great they imported equipment from Italy and began selling pasta direct to the public, which soon spread beyond immigrant communities.

With the brothers getting older and the long hours working at the restaurant taking their toll, the Romany was sold in 1988.

That heralded in a new venture, with the next generation of Lenzarinis ramping up the pasta business under the name
Golden Ravioli.

Narciso, now 85, is the last surviving brother but there’s plenty of children and grand-children coming up through the ranks to ensure the family business continues.

“Now we have gone to the third generation,” Linda Lenzarini says.

The family has received plenty of recognition over the years for its achievements, including a gong from the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Lucca, which recognises those promoting Italian culture outside Italy.