A Warilla single mum-of-four, who lost everything when her social housing home burnt down three years ago, lives in constant fear that the same thing will happen to her current fibro Housing NSW cottage.
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Kirsty Woodroffe, 43, believes that old, overloaded wiring in the region's crumbling public dwellings are putting lives at risk.
But with a young son still under her roof, the aged care worker said she had no option but to remain in her "fire trap" or risk becoming homeless in a worsening private rental market.
Kirsty was in Sydney, enjoying her first girl's night out after a tumultuous period in her life, when her first public housing cottage on Spofforth Street went up in flames in late 2019.
The four-bedroom property, one of many public housing homes built around the 1950s and '60s, had offered the family a fresh start.
A year later, it was charred rubble and they were homeless and traumatised all over again.
"When we got that house we were so happy it was amazing," Kirsty said.
"Then we lost it and I didn't realise you could get any lower than what we had been."
A broken-down train causing havoc on the Illawarra line meant she couldn't get home on the night of the fire, but she said a firefighter called with an update.
"He said everything was destroyed and the likely cause was electrical and that it had started in my bedroom," Kirsty said.
"I did have power boards in my room and they believe they probably started from there somewhere, but I never got told the cause officially."
A recent government information (GIPA) request by the Mercury revealed that unless a fire in an Illawarra social housing dwelling is the result of accident or arson, a tenant is unlikely to ever learn the official cause.
Since July 1, 2018, there have been around 47 properties damaged by fire in the region, the Department of Planning and Environment said.
Of these, nine were identified as accidents caused by tenant behaviour and five due to arson or suspected arson.
Not a single fire in the past five years has been attributed to an electrical fault, with the causes of fire in the remaining 33 properties recorded as unknown or under investigation.
NSW Fire and Rescue Illawarra Chief Inspector Chad Wallace told the Mercury it can be difficult to determine the causes of fire because the evidence often burns.
"If the fire is deemed major, like there's loss of life or a total loss of property, we'll bring specialist investigators in and so will the police at a significant cost," he said.
"Now that's a high-level investigation that can't happen for every single fire in every single house in NSW.
"So if they're only really small or minor fires, it might be put as cause unknown.
"It's highly probable that it was an electrical fault, but unless we can prove it, it will go down as unknown fire without throwing every single resource at it."
Chief Insp Wallace said the NSW Land and Housing Corporation "has a robust maintenance schedule", with any faults that are potentially a risk to health and safety "normally fixed very quickly".
It only took Housing NSW a few weeks to find Kirsty and her children a replacement house after the fire.
But with no home contents insurance and very little money, Kirsty was reliant entirely on donations from the community and a GoFundMe that raised $700.
"I took the key and said 'thank you very much', but I thought what do I put in it now?" she said.
"We came to an empty home with nothing and the assistance stops there.
"I know I should have had home contents insurance, yes, but who takes ownership for the neglect in the property?
"Every landlord has standards they need to maintain and I'm telling you they don't do it, I've not had one proper inspection since I moved in here."
With raw sewage in the yard, broken kitchen cupboards, windows that are too hard to open and a front door that keeps coming loose, Kirsty has never been a fan of the rundown home she was given.
But when the neighbours told her that one of the bedrooms had been damaged in a fire prior to her moving in, her dislike turned to terror.
A spokesperson for the NSW Department of Planning and Environment confirmed there had been a fire in the home in August 2018, the cause of which was unknown.
They said rectification work was completed shortly after the blaze, while maintenance - including an assessment on the electrical system - was undertaken in September 2019, prior to Kirsty moving in.
Kirsty's fears about her new home were compounded when an electrician sent by Housing NSW to fix the power following a storm allegedly told her that half of the house needed to be rewired due to safety issues.
"He was going to put in a job request to have the whole half of my house rewired because he said it's a hazard, it needs rewiring," she said.
"That was over 12 months ago and it still hasn't happened so I feel like I'm living in a house that's going to go up in flames at any time."
The department spokesperson said a maintenance contractor conducts annual assessments across all its assets and the latest for this property "does not indicate a major electrical rewire is required".
Kirsty said the contractor checked the smoke alarm in her hallway was working, before leaving without inspecting the rest of the house.
To ease her concerns, the spokesperson said they would arrange for a contractor to conduct a full report on the electrical system in the property.
"i'm not whinging about having a home or being provided with something that is at a subsidised value," Kirsty said.
"I'm a low-income worker so I'm grateful for what I get, but i think it needs to be safe too.
"I don't want to lose everything again."
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