There is light at the end of the tunnel for Wyevale ball diamond users.
At the recent Tiny Township council meeting, public works director Tim Leitch requested a council decision to apply for a Community Sport and Recreation Infrastructure Fund grant before its expiry at the end of the month.
“There was a project that was identified a couple of years ago to upgrade the lighting in the Wyevale Park to LED lighting,” Leitch explained to council. “We had some good community involvement; there were some donations involved which was very encouraging; those are the kind of projects that we really like to dig our teeth into.”
However, upon digging deeper into the issue, township staff discovered stress cracks within the concrete poles which were attributed to load bearing of both the current lighting as well as the safety netting attached.
Due to the additional information, it was recommended that replacement of the lighting as well as the poles be put into budgetary considerations for 2025 capital projects, to be discussed in early December by council.
Newly hired recreation and special events director Josh Pallas joined Leitch in discovering the grant and its opportunities to improve Wyevale Park.
“It’s a 50-50 grant. The spending is $300,000,” said Leitch, “of which we would be responsible for half of that cost.”
Should the township be funded through the grant, Leitch listed many items of Wyevale Park which could be addressed, including: the poles and lighting; foul ball screening; repairs for fencing and electrical; bleachers; accessibility areas and paths, and improvements to the snack bar.
“To say the capital project is the poles and the LED lighting for the grant,” said Leitch, “we’re going to be looking at additional items so we can look at it as an upgrade to the entire facility, which is a good way to look at grants instead of very specific, localized items.”
He added: “That’ll be a big, big savings for us moving into the 2025 capital, and also achieve what the community has been desiring.”
A community effort to fundraise for the project had seen those funds returned to donors in August due to financial and legal advice from township legal staff after delays meant those donations wouldn’t be applied on the project at that time.
Members of council asked Leitch what financial commitment approving the grant request would mean, but were assured that it was only an approval to apply for the grant.
“If we get the grant, we’ll definitely be able to do more; if we don’t get the grant then we’re resorting back to our original pole-light replacement,” said Leitch. “We will mention that in the grant that we did have an interested community; that always helps with grants when you see that community participation within.”
Mayor Dave Evans praised Leitch and Pallas for “finding a good synergy here”, while also calling the grant application “an exciting one”.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.
