A BROULEE home which has been the subject of controversy in recent years has been sold by its owners, Paul and Monica Gerondal.
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The Gerondals own two Eurobodalla properties – a Bayside Street beachfront home in Broulee owned by Mr Gerondal, and a rural Bingi block, owned by Mrs Gerondal.
The couple made headlines when Eurobodalla Shire Council forcibly removed 100 tonnes of the couple’s possessions from the Bingi property under a court-sanctioned order in 2012.
The council commenced bankruptcy proceedings against the couple in 2013 to recover its costs associated with the clean-up and court battles.
Before the Bingi matter, however, the Broulee home attracted attention due to the large amount of material stored on the block.
Complaints ultimately led to Mr Gerondal being found guilty of the charge of using the Broulee property as an “illegal waste facility”, in Moruya Local Court in November 2008.
The charge related to his storage of items including building materials, concrete pipes, steel girders and beams, treated timber poles, metal sheeting, unused bricks and masonry and water pipes.
The couple had been collecting the items to build a home from recycled materials at Bingi.
The Broulee home was listed with LJ Hooker late last year and scheduled for auction.
The house was touted as needing “more than a lot of work” but the property had “endless possibilities”.
Mr and Mrs Gerondal, who expressed their dissatisfaction with previous stories published by Fairfax Media about their plight, would only respond to questions from the Bay Post/Moruya Examiner by email.
They would not say why they chose to list the property, how much council was seeking from them, whether the sale of the property would cover these costs, their future plans for the Bingi property, or when bankruptcy proceedings were expected to be finalised.
They did say that the term “sold” was a “loose term” and the couple chose “not to disclose the status of the Broulee property”.
When asked how they were feeling about it all, Mr Gerondal replied: “It’s only money you are talking about, or is it?”
In regards to a counter claim Mr Gerondal lodged in the Federal Circuit Court in 2013, where he sought $592,825 from Eurobodalla council for “loss of items unlawfully removed in the name of ‘waste’,” Mr Gerondal said the status had “since changed to a combined proceeding”.
Asked if there was anything they would like the community to know about their plight, Mr Gerondal said: “We are sure the community would not like to be misled, and the council will be forced to suddenly come clean.”
He added that the couple had “paragraphs and paragraphs of info but you could not possibly print the total story and printing the allowable amount of info will certainly spoil the truth.”
Couple has a long history in courts
FOLLOWING Paul Gerondal’s prosecution in Moruya Local Court over the state of his Broulee property, the couple moved many of the items to Bingi.
The council continued to pursue the couple, and after a cleanup order for the Bingi property was not complied with in 2009, the Land and Environment Court ordered Monica Gerondal to submit an action plan to contain what it deemed as “waste” on the property to a 10-metre square footprint and remove what was left.
The plan was not submitted, and in March 2012, Justice Peter Biscoe ordered that if Mrs Gerondal did not comply with orders within three months, council was entitled to enter the property and carry out works at her cost.
Justice Biscoe commented that Mrs Gerondal had not complied “with a single direction made by the court at any time during the course of these proceedings”.
Council employed a contractor to remove 100 tonnes of possessions it deemed “waste” under the Protection of the Environment Operations Act in 2012.
The couple refused to pay for the cleanup and council’s legal costs, as was ordered by the court, and council began bankruptcy action in the Federal Circuit Court in 2013.
In December 2013 the couple estimated they owed about $450,000.
It is understood the ACT Government has also spent more than $100,000 trying to resolve a saga relating to the Gerondals’ Waramanga home.
An extension to the home has been a work in progress since the late 1970s.
The Canberra Times reports that the couple, who have been afflicted by poor health and a lack of finances, have “repeatedly ignored and then challenged or appealed orders” from a range of tribunals, authorities and even the Supreme Court to clean up the site and finish the building work.