Game, set and match to Albany Tennis Club as State Budget serves up $1.5m for new courts and floodlights

While Albany Racing Club was the biggest winner in terms of the State Budget’s sporting allocations, it also felt like game, set and match to Albany Tennis Club. The racing club was celebrating an allocation of $3.84 million for infrastructure upgrades at Percy Spencer Racecourse while Albany Tennis Club has been budgeted $1.5m to add four courts and floodlighting to its new North Road facility. Club captain Les Bairstow said the first item on the agenda would be to install lighting on the six courts which are already in place at the Albany Regional Tennis Centre. He rejected criticism that the courts, which were opened in January this year, have been under used since becoming the base for the merged Merrifield Park and Lawley Park clubs. “Once the lights go up, we will be able to resume our corporate tennis activity, our pennants teams and have social get-togethers when the evenings get dark early,” he said. “We have 180 members, and the new courts and lights are essential to the future growth of the club,” he said. The works should be relatively simple because the drainage and civil works were done when the original courts were laid, he said. Albany Speedway Club also received a bumper award with $400,000 allocated for upgrades to the safety wall and catch fence. Grants committee member and former club president Kevin Theyer said the fence was 30 years old and had outlived its purpose. “There are different conditions in place safety-wise from when the fence was first put up and it needs to be replaced,” he said. “We are extremely lucky to get this money and to have enjoyed the support of former MP Rebecca Stephens, City of Albany and the Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries.” He hoped the posts and bracing could be installed during the next speedway season, which starts in November, with the new fence going in after the season ends at Easter next year. The budget also allocated $200,000 towards a new all-abilities fishing jetty in Albany. Michael McMullan, the executive officer of Fishability, an organisation which helps people with disabilities enjoy recreational fishing, said a feasibility study would investigate putting in new facilities at Emu Point.