Court upgrade fund

Premier Mark McGowan delivered on an election commitment in Rockingham last week by granting $373,000 for the resurfacing of the basketball courts at the Mike Barnett Sports Complex.

Through the Local Projects, Local Jobs program the funding will go towards upgrading the courts and purchasing electronic scoreboards. This will enable additional basketball and netball games to be hosted in Rockingham, while the scoreboards will assist volunteers who enter data manually. Mr McGowan said he was pleased to announce funding in his Rockingham electorate.

“I am pleased to deliver on this election commitment — it will be a very important change for the sporting community in Rockingham because thousands of people use this facility,” he said.

“The current floors are tired and there is a safety issue as well as an appearance issue. I’d like to thank the club for all their efforts in lobbying for it.

“My electorate has been very good to me — this has been a significant issue that people have raised with me over the years so I am pleased to be able to fix it.”

Rockingham Basketball and Recreation Association president Clive Higgins said basketball continued to grow in popularity among local youth and local players had gone on to play in national competitions.

“Because we have been growing so significantly in the last three years, we are running out of physical space to play games,” he said.

“By resurfacing these four courts we actually get the ability to use the middle courts for basketball.

“It means that on a weekly basis we will be able to schedule around another 48 games.”

City of Rockingham Mayor Barry Sammels said the upgrade was overdue.

“The facilities have been around for a number of years and as you can see they need a bit of work to be done,” he said.

“The City will facilitate the work and we appreciate the commitment from the State Government - we will be undertaking the management of the facility and replacing the backboards and the hoops.

“We will make sure the work is done – it is really important for the centre and it is really important for the kids that play sport here.”