By Galen Simmons, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
A longstanding dispute between St. Marys’ pickleball and tennis groups over use of the town’s existing courts appears to be closer to resolution after representatives of both groups worked with councillors and town staff towards at least a short-term solution as part of an ad-hoc committee Feb. 5.
As part of St. Marys’ new recreation and leisure master plan drafted by Monteith Brown Planning Consultants and adopted by council on Jan. 28, the consultants examined the existing tennis and pickleball courts and activities in St. Marys and recommended an immediate and long-term strategy for equitable court use between the St. Marys Pickleball Association and St. Marys Tennis Club.
Currently, St. Marys has four courts for racket sports at 550 Water St. S. The town’s two north courts have lines for pickleball and tennis, while the two south courts are painted for tennis only.
“(Painting) pickleball lines on courts; that came out of our first, original rec and leisure masterplan in 2017,” said town director of community services Stephanie Ische at the ad-hoc committee meeting. “At that time, pickleball lines were painted on the north courts allowing for both play on that side of the courts specifically. After they were painted, there were some additional lines painted a few years after that, after COVID, and we did add a few lines to the courts for additional pickleball courts, for which the pickleball association provides their own nets for the club to use, but they’re not accessible to the public. Those courts are accessible to the club, but not the public.
“ … (Last year), we knew there was a need because there was a definite need for more resources in the community when it came to recreation and culture. … The (master-plan update) consultants did a lot of research and review for us and have extensive knowledge of racket-sports courts, which was a benefit to us.”
Though the consultants recommended adding four pickleball-court lines to the south tennis courts to create multi-lined courts and provide portable pickleball nets for all courts for the public to use until dedicated courts for pickleball are established at some point in the future, both the pickleball association and tennis club took issue with the recommendation.
“Really what I had suggested to council is … it’s inherently inefficient to put pickleball courts on tennis courts in the numbers that we’re currently doing – that is two (pickleball) courts on one tennis court when, in fact, there’s room for about four pickleball courts on one tennis court,” said tennis club representative Don Van Galen, who first presented the club’s concerns with the consultants’ recommendations at council’s Jan. 28 meeting, leading to the establishment of the ad-hoc committee comprising two members from each club as well as councillors Marg Luna and Fern Pridham, with Mayor All Strathdee serving as chair. “I’m not saying that because I’m advocating for four (pickleball courts); I’m advocating for best use of space in expanding the facilities, and I believe there is room to do that.”
“Merlin (Leis) and I come to this meeting representing the St. Marys Pickleball Association,” said Mike Ferguson. “We’re both avid pickleballers … and we’re also here to advocate for the overall pickleball community. Our mandate from our group is to come here openly and discuss options for the future and in the short term. We absolutely recognize both parties love our sport and the Water Street location really isn’t great for either one of us at the moment. We also recognize that it may not be great in the short term, but we’re here today and over a few more meetings to discuss what will work best for us in the future. Both parties have made it absolutely clear that … dedicated court facilities for both sports is the ideal, but we also have to recognize the Town of St. Marys has this challenge of doing all this … within their budget constraints. So, we’re open minded … and it’s understood we’re here to work together.”
According to the recently adopted recreation and leisure master plan, the St. Marys Tennis Club has 72 members and the St. Marys Pickleball Association has 140 members. Based on the consultants’ recommendations, town CAO Brent Kittmer said those membership numbers do not warrant new, dedicated facilities at this time, though at the rate both clubs are growing, discussion around the construction of dedicated facilities driven by the community will likely happen at some point in the future, be that the development of new outdoor racket-sport courts or the establishment of pickleball courts inside existing town recreation buildings like the Pyramid Recreation Centre (PRC).
In the meantime, however, the pickleball and tennis club representatives say the current layout of pickleball and tennis lines on the north courts make it difficult for players of either game and are not suitable for competitive play. They suggested the consultants’ recommendation to add pickleball lines to the south tennis courts would do nothing to solve those issues and would likely not address current issues around court capacity.
“We can proceed to look at the layouts, but again, I’m open to suggestions or proposals,” Strathdee said. “Council took a stand … and there was a suggestion perhaps there wasn’t enough consultation, which I disagree with, but council thought, ‘Let’s have some more consultation and sit the groups down.’ So, we’re looking for ideas.
“I might as well be blunt. Council is facing a $2-million shortfall right now for pool repairs at the PRC that were never anticipated or expected or reserved for. We don’t have half a million dollars or a million dollars to throw at this project. We have also researched a lot of different ways we could go. Both sports create noise, so sometimes there’s problems being in residential areas and, rightly or wrongly, when we get new parkland, it is on residential land. The purpose of this meeting, in my mind, is to look for new and innovative solutions. If we want to … talk about lines, I’m totally open to that. There have been a lot of letters and comments, and this has been 10 painful years of my life listening to both groups, to be quite frank. In my view, everyone’s been respectful but I don’t have a solution. We’re looking for short-term and long-term solutions.”
Following extensive discussion and review of the current court layout over the course of the more than two-hour-long meeting, the committee asked staff to research and determine the costs of two potential short-term solutions, and a potential long-term solution to the clubs’ concerns.
The proposed short-term solutions arrived at were to either repaint the existing north courts to create six pickleball courts (four shared, two dedicated) and one shared tennis court, or to repaint the north courts to create six pickleball courts and two shared tennis courts.
For the long term, staff were asked to research the potential for expanding the existing Water Street racket-sport courts to create an additional four dedicated pickleball courts.
Staff will bring their findings back to the ad-hoc committee at its next meeting on Feb. 19. The committee is expected to make its recommendation to council at its March 11 meeting.
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