Councillor Alex Karavas has been the driving motivator behind the reinstatement of the committee which holds simple objectives: ‘Develop a plan for the installation of CCTV in the Mudgee CBD with particular reference to Byron Place and Mudgee Town Centre carparks’.

This call for CCTV is not a new movement in the town of Mudgee however, with mayor Des Kennedy previously involved in a similar committee years ago.

“I was apart of the committee some years ago that moved on this issue,” Mayor Kennedy revealed at the March 15 council meeting.

“We met a lot of difficulties in terms of logistics and costs, and the committee couldn’t get past these difficulties in the long run.”

For now, however, it appears that movements have been made to reinvigorate issue, especially after calls for the system have been renewed.

The local public has already made major moves in demanding the video footage system be built in Byron Place and the town centre, including a petition located on www.change.org and a 94.77% positive response rate on the Mudgee Guardian’s online poll for the issue.

These calls came after Rebekah Piscioneri’s vehicle was damaged on January 29, and after she took to social media to share her grievances she found a bastion of supporters for her cause.

Cr Karavas responded to this issue, and is pleased that the motion was passed with little issue.

“We’re looking to get the committee set up as quickly as possible so that we can make progress on getting the systems in place,” he said.

Cr Percy Thompson also suggested Gulgong should be included in the CCTV projects, a movement Cr Karavas is sure the committee will touch on.

“It really depends on the initial budget that we have available to us, the committee is going to look at all of these options and go from there,” he said.

The General Manager, Mayor Kennedy, Cr Karavas and the Youth Mayor are now set to meet with community figureheads in coming weeks to discuss the next step in the ‘Community Safety’ plan.