Grand County’s first ever public pickleball courts devoted to that sport alone could be ready to use by August in Granby.<\/p>\n
After two or three years of encouragement from the growing
\ngroup of pickleball players in Granby and surrounding areas, a contract was
\napproved by the Granby Board of Trustees to build two courts in Polhamus Park.<\/p>\n
Pickleball is a paddleball sport that combines elements from
\ntennis, badminton and table tennis. According to the USA Pickleball
\nAssociation, it is the fast growing sport in the country.<\/p>\n
Converted courts have been popping up across the county as more players pick up the paddles, including taping over unused basketball or tennis courts, using open gym times at recreation centers and sharing courts with tennis players. Now Granby will have the first public courts devoted to only this sport.<\/p>\n
While some board members expressed concern about the optics
\nof moving forward with such a project during the coronavirus crisis, it was
\napproved unanimously with the condition to possibly add vapor guards.<\/p>\n
The bid for the project from Renner Sports Surfaces will
\ncost $87,860, not including the vapor guards, but not all of this money will
\ncome from the town.<\/p>\n
According to Julie Martin, recreation director for Granby, of the $92,500 of funding she has worked to obtain for the project, only $35,000 comes from Granby\u2019s capital reserves. This was budgeted for by the town last fall.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of this money for this project is not money that can
\nbe used for anything other than recreation,\u201d Martin added.<\/p>\n
Thirty thousand dollars come from the Granby Conservation
\nTrust Funds, which must be spent on parks and recreation. Other moneys already
\nsecured include a $10,000 private donation, $5,000 from the Recreation, Open
\nSpace and Housing Foundation and $5,000 from the Grand County Commissioners
\nConservation Trust Funds.<\/p>\n
Only $7,500 has not yet been secured, included a $5,000
\ngrant from the Grand Foundation and $2,500 from a pickleball group donation.<\/p>\n
The project, which had initially been scheduled for a vote March 24, was delayed because of the many coronavirus closures, including restaurants and ski resorts, that occurred that week. Three weeks later, most board members were glad to move forward with the project though some hesitation remained.<\/p>\n
\u201c(I\u2019m concerned about) the optics when so many people are
\nout of work and struggling on their basics of food and rent,\u201d Trustee Natascha
\nO\u2019Flaherty said. \u201cWhile I do believe it\u2019s a great public works project and an
\nunbelievable resource for the town, the timing just seems bad right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Martin pointed out that this would be free to the community
\nand, if current guidelines persist through the summer, it would be an ideal
\nrecreational resource during social distancing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI agree that it might \u2014 to people on the outside \u2014 look frivolous at time like this, but at the same time it shows we\u2019re moving forward,\u201d Martin said.<\/p>\n
Mayor Paul Chavoustie expressed his support for the project. He pointed out that it could create jobs, that Granby\u2019s financial position as a debt free town puts it in a more secure position and that the board has already moved to support small businesses.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s a step in the right direction to show that
\nwe\u2019re moving forward,\u201d Chavoustie added. \u201cThis isn\u2019t going to last forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
The contractors said they plan to have the courts finished by the end of July. Martin said her hope is that pickleball players can get a couple months of use out of the courts before winter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Grand County’s first ever public pickleball courts devoted to that sport alone could be ready to use by August in Granby. After two or three years of encouragement from the growing group of pickleball players in Granby and surrounding areas, a contract was approved by the Granby Board of Trustees to build two courts in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[97],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-11 19:59:43","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KIFT - The LIFT FM","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46107"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46107\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kift\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}