This afternoon saw the signing of a contract to replace our present artificial green with a new surface produced by Dales NZ.
Ken Hayward, a member of the team involved with getting the club to this stage, has given me a report for my Blog.
The report follows and gives a clear insight on the amount of work that has gone into getting the club to this stage:
The report follows and gives a clear insight on the amount of work that has gone into getting the club to this stage:
The Contract is Signed !
After many months of planning, fund raising and negotiation President Paul Skilton and Dales NZ Director Tony Pellet signed the contract for the construction of our new artificial green on Thursday 10 June. The signing of the contract represents the culmination of many months of hard work by a small team dedicated to the concept of a better artificial playing surface for our club.
The replacement of the Astrograss green was first mooted at the AGM of the club on 21 June 2008 by Neville Turnbull who raised a challenge to the members by asking them if they would like a new green if it was at no cost to them. Naturally, the response was a pretty resounding vote in the affirmative. But there the matter lay dormant for another eleven months until May 2009 when Mayor Brendan Duffy called a combined meeting of the Horowhenua clubs to outline his council’s proposal for a ‘greenfield’ bowling centre at Western Park. This was not met with a great deal of enthusiasm by this or any other club and led to our Executive revisiting the green replacement proposal as they recognized the need to move to secure our club’s future.
By July 2009 the playing and social needs of our members were surveyed and assessed and work began on our club’s strategic plan to chart the way forward. In September a sub-committee consisting of Paul Skilton, Neville, Turnbull, Brian Paquin and Ken Hayward was formed to investigate the green proposal in earnest. Neville, Brian and Paul attended a meeting at the Waikanae club who were following a similar path, and the sub-committee visited the Havelock North and Waipawa clubs where new greens of the Dales carpet had been recently laid down.
The rest of 2009 was a period of intense activity – writing a Club plan, following that with an Operations plan with the help of Bowls NZ’s community development officer Paul Cavanagh, researching the various alternative products and companies available. By October the decision had been made to go with the Dales Pro-Green Plus surface and a SGM of the club was held to put the proposal to the membership. Paul Skilton introduced the plan, Ken Hayward fleshed out the details about the product and the replacement process, and Brian Paquin put forward the financial proposal. The sub-committee was pleased to welcome Waikanae President Brian Cuff who outlined the research that their club had done and their reasons for choosing the Dales product. Still, it was something of a surprise (considering the talk in the clubrooms) when the meeting voted virtually unanimously to approve of the project subject to suitable finance being available.
Then came the phase of writing applications (and getting rejected) and reapplications to five different gaming Trusts and the Eastern & Central Community Trust between November and April. I think it is fair to say that we were very pleasantly surprised by the final outcome – $ 100, 000 in grants in a very tight market. The success was in large part due to the contacts made with key personnel in the Trusts, persistence and our decision to get our club registered as a Charitable Organization ( which we achieved in April ) and which we feel greatly improved our chances of receiving funding where others had failed. Very important too was the willingness of many of our members to contribute funds through the debenture scheme.
A number of meetings of the Executive were held to thrash out the finer points of the contract but by today we feel that we have got to the end of that phase of the project. So where to from now ?
The initial payment of $ 50, 000 has been made, the carpet has been ordered and will be here by late July. Tony Pellet and his partner have to complete their project at Wilton BC in Wellington before they begin our job. They have been held up by the inclement Wellington weather but expect to be here to begin the work in late July – ahead of Waikanae who began the process long before us. The first stage is to uplift the Astrograss, cut it into 5 m x 5 m pieces, and sell it to whoever will buy it. If you have a use for some Astrograss or know someone who has, please mention it to them. Then 10 cms of sand will be removed (do you need a sand pit for the mokopuna) the base consolidated and leveled, and finally the new neddle-punched carpet laid and sewn together.
Our contract is very specific. The green must meet World Bowls standards for speed, evenness of surface, levels, and the evenness of the draw on both hands on all rinks. We have engaged greens consultants to check on the levels and speed 3 months after the surface is laid. If the surface does not perform to our speed requirements within 12 months it will be replaced at no cost to the club.
All this means disruption for our membership. For 3 -6 weeks in Late July – August the green will be closed and we know that it will need a settling in period of several months but we feel that it will be the beginning of a new era of bowls at our club with the best artificial green in the centre with all the benefits that that implies.
Secretary Ian Wenham, Dales Director Tony Pellet
with President Paul Skilton signing the contract.