Bellarine Police Station welcomes new officer in charge

BELLARINE Police Station has a new officer in charge, with Senior Sergeant Dean Parello taking the reins.

Sgt Parello joined the force in 1990 as a constable in Corio and has since worked in various roles across the region, including as officer in charge at Portarlington, where he opened the station.

“I enjoy doing this type of policing, policing in the community, it’s always been a goal to run my own police station as a senior sergeant,” he said.

“The opportunity for this station doesn’t come up too often, so I seized the opportunity.”

In recent years he has been based at D24, Victoria Police’s state communications centre, gaining experience in co-ordinating police responses.

While Sgt Parello gets used to being back in the operational space, he plans on getting back on the tools and hitting the streets for a couple of shifts to better understand the challenges and advancements.

His number one goal in taking up the posting is to ensure the community feels safe, alongside his team.

“Probably my most important goal is to make sure that my staff feel well supported, that they’re healthy, they’re mental health is good and so that I have staff at work who can then police the community,” he said.

“And then, start interacting with the community and responding to their needs, I’ll do that by listening to the community.”

Road trauma is also a major focus for the Senior Sergeant, hoping he can drive numbers down by working with the team in Portarlington on all of the smaller feeder roads.

Driven by making a difference, Sgt Parello is looking forward to being able to look back in 12 months’ time and seeing the progress he has made.