By Nino Bucci
Buying land near a prison may not seem the wisest investment.
But for a Lara farming couple, the $190,000 they paid for two blocks behind Barwon Prison is starting to look like a steal.
Inside Barwon Prison. The expansion announced on Thursday would roughly double the size of the facility.Credit: Angela Wylie
The couple, who do not wish to be named, own the two blocks immediately to the east of the prison, which the state government is set to expand.
The Lara prison precinct expansion announced on Thursday would roughly double the size of Barwon Prison, Corrections Minister Gayle Tierney said.
Marngoneet Correctional Centre in the foreground with Barwon Prison behind.Credit: Craig Abraham
And that announcement means those blocks could now be worth as much as $5 million, according to a commercial real estate agent recently involved in a $25 million sale in the area.
The blocks are used for cropping, or for sheep to graze, but could one day be home to some of the hardest crooks in Victoria.
The farmers bought the first block, on Peak School Road, for $80,000, in 1987.
The prison, seen as a long-term replacement for Geelong and Pentridge prisons, was being built at the time.
They bought the second block, in Chisholm Road, for $110,000 in 2000 – a decade after Barwon opened.
The previous year, the state government revealed there were only 60 prison beds free in the state, while the population in police cells swelled to 200.
The two blocks combined are around 128 hectares, according to one half of the farming couple.
She said that they received a letter from the state government requesting a meeting the day before the prison expansion was announced.
The couple has not responded to the request, and are still unclear about their intentions for the land.
"We will just have to see what they have got to say," she said.
"If they want the land, we'll take it from there.
"It's not necessarily going to be to the east. It could be north, or the other side of the road, to the west. Until we speak to them we don't know."
Ms Tierney said that the government would consider compulsorily acquiring the land, and denied it was in a weakened bargaining position by declaring its intentions before negotiating with the land owners.
It appears the most favourable site would be the Chisholm Road property, which is immediately behind Barwon Prison, and roughly the same size as the block currently occupied by the prison.
The Peak School Road block is immediately to the east of Marngoneet Correctional Centre, which is next to Barwon Prison.
It is unclear whether the government will buy only the land it needs for the expansion, or use the negotiating process to secure another block for the long term.
The landowner said she had not previously been approached by the state government about the land.
Another nearby landowner said he had not heard from the state government, nor heard of any other local farmers being approached.
The prisons are bordered to the west by Bacchus Marsh Road, to the north by the dirt Peak School Road, and to the south by Chisholm Road – the blocks to the east are the only sites which would allow the prison to expand without crossing a road, which could present security and logistical challenges.
Andrew Thorburn, a commercial real estate agent at Gross Waddell, was involved in the $25 million sale of a 79.6 hectare block in Lara to developers last August.
The Patullos Road farm is six kilometres south of Barwon Prison, has a residential zoning and is likely to become a housing estate.
That did not mean that land values in the area were not favourable to those who may be approached about selling for the prison expansion, Mr Thorburn said.
He said they could expect between $20,000 to $40,000 a hectare – even though the land was "not much use to anyone other than government" when it came to development, given its location near the prison and agricultural zoning.
More details about the expansion – including its proposed cost, size, and a timeline for its completion – are expected to be released in the state budget in May.
Its announcement was heralded by Labor as underlining its law and order credentials ahead of the November election, as it proved that the 3135 extra police they had funded, and hardline sentencing reforms, would get results.
But Opposition Leader Matthew Guy derided the announcement as panicked and a thought bubble.