By Oliver Lees
Netball facilities at the Sunbury Lions Football Netball Club will receive a facelift, following an announcement of $400,000 for the club to build a second court and improve lighting.
Sunbury Lions secretary Alan O’Connor said he was relieved to hear the news after more than four years of advocacy.
“I first presented to council for the 2018 budget so I’ve been at it for a while, but it’s really good to finally get it cleared,” Mr O’Connor said.
“The need has been there for some time, our netball program has been growing with an extra couple teams in the last two years. And currently the lights are terrible, we haven’t been able to play night matches which is a real problem by the time daylight savings comes along.
“Some teams have only been able to train once every two weeks.”
As it stands the club has five senior teams, an under-19’s team and four junior teams all sharing the one court at the Sunbury Recreation Reserve.
The need for new lighting at the club was identified by council in 2018 following a community consultation process.
Since then the club has presented a submission to the council for the 2018-19 and 2019-20 budget.
Hume councillor Jack Medcraft said he was glad to see the club receive the funding.
“I’ve always felt if you’re going to have a sporting complex it’s only fair to give two netball courts instead of one,” Cr Medcraft said.
“I’ve been advocating for this for years so I’m very happy that it’s happened this way.”
Cr Jarrod Bell said he was supportive of the “brilliant” project.
“The netball club has done an outstanding job running a fantastic program using this court using these facilities for a long time,” he said.
“But they’ve never really been up to the standard that we all really expect of a growing sport like netball.”
Cr Trevor Dance said the funding allocation was “long overdue”.
Mr O’Connor said he had been informed the works would commence after the conclusion of the current netball season.
