North Coast Leisure Centre awarded grant from Leader Programme
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Directors and staff at the North Coast Leisure Centre were delighted to receive confirmation recently that the Highland Leader Programme had approved their application for a grant of up to £54,180 to facilitate a two year Community Development Project intended to broaden the scope of the Centre’s activities and increase its capacity to deliver a health promoting and energising suite of services to its eight hundred square mile catchment area.
Other contributions towards the £85,880.00 estimated cost of the programme have come from the Robertson Trust, which granted £24,000.00, the Daniel Trust, which gifted £5,000.00, Friends of North Coast Leisure who came up with £1,000.00 and North Coast Leisure itself which, together with a local tradesperson, put up £1,700.00 in kind.
A significant proportion of the cash will go to finance the appointment of a Community Development Officer, whose job will be to manage the refurbishment expenditure which is planned and to explore and carry forward a series of much more ambitious projects which are under consideration. Initial work, which will start as soon as an appropriate appointment has been made, include an upgrade of the changing rooms, minor alterations to the pool hall, rejuvenation of the reception area, installation of a poolside hoist, the modernisation of the pool’s advertising materials and the building of a community website to integrate and enhance the promotion of the pool and its place. Further down the line will hopefully come the further greening of the pool through the recycling of water and increased use of renewable energy, its establishment as a centre of excellence for physical therapy and, if all goes well, the holy grail could be the creation of a community games hall on the site, a plan first mooted at the opening of the pool in April 1995.
Company Secretary, Jim A. Johnston, welcomed the award as follows; ‘Leader’s decision to fund our forward looking project on this scale and at the present time will give us an excellent opportunity, not just to secure the future of the pool and its ancillary facilities, but to take a major step forward in the services we provide, and how we provide them, despite the countrywide backdrop of cutbacks and austerity.’
