Lloydminster council has approved funding for the Lloydminster Catholic School Division (LCSD) to build a new artificial turf field at Holy Rosary high school.
The presentation requesting the funding was made during the Aug. 19 regular council meeting.
The school board requested $200,000 from the municipal government for the field. The total cost of the project is just over $2 million with $600,000 confirmed coming form local donations, $375,000 pending from local donations and $900,000 from a provincial grant.
The project will not only benefit the school division it will also be available for use by the city for user groups such as football, soccer and rugby.
“It’s a great investment in terms of partnership for the city of Lloydminster because we’re getting this for the community use at a fraction of the price that it would cost if the city was to do it on its own.” Explained Coun. Jonathan Torresan. “There’s already considerable support from the community in terms of the fundraising” “to me it’s really a no brainer to get an improved product that would help from an economic development point of view for all the sports tourism that comes with it, for a pretty small price in the grand scheme of things.”
During the question-and-answer period other questions were brought up such as if the educational funds would be used for the project.
“Operational funding does not get used for capital development in school divisions, so we don’t use educations funds on this particular project,” said Nigel McCarthy, from the LCSD.
McCarthy was also asked how the school division would pay for repairs or potential replacements down the road.
“Community user groups would pay a small rental fee for the use,” he explains. “We will, in the case of this operation, put away funds in reserve from that rental in order to replace and/or repair.”
“We have been successful in using the reserve-based system in order to slowly grow the reserve and anticipate being able to maintain and/or replace that field surface given end of its useful life which is approximately 15 years.”
The anticipated costs of the field according to McCarthy include the sweeping of the field and labour for the sweeping as well as locking and unlocking during the April to thanksgiving period.
It was also clarified that the city would not be part of any maintenance or facility operational costs.
Holy Rosary has its own dressing rooms on the second storey that have their own dedicated entrance should a sports team need it.
Council approved the request for funding and directed administration to enter into a joint use agreement with the LCSD for after-hours community use.
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