[As published in July/August BayBuzz magazine.]
The Regional Sports Park in Hastings is graced with some of the best sport facilities in the country, but for some codes, such as the two founding tenant codes – Netball and Athletics – delays in finishing a park spatial plan and a stalled Trust merger are causing unwanted headaches.
Most users of the netball courts, hockey turfs, running track, 50 metre indoor swimming pool or canoe polo, that are part of nearly $100 million in community and high performance sport assets would think that Mitre 10 Sports Park is council owned and operated by the council or some form of council-controlled entity.
However, there are two trusts involved. The original, the Regional Sports Park Trust, was formed after the Hastings District Council sold Nelson Park – the home of athletics and club rugby – to large retail (Big Box) developers for $18m and used $11m to purchase the Percival Road greenfields site to relocate athletics and netball.
The other – the Hawke’s Bay Community Fitness Centre Trust – was founded by Sir Graeme Avery and Bruce MacTaggart to create a community and high performance centre.
Back in 2007 former Hastings Mayor Lawrence Yule established the Regional Sports Park Trust to raise the additional funds to build a vastly enhanced track and field facility for the Hastings Athletics Association and a regional hub for netball.
It was an instant success, seeing the athletics club attract new members and host major national events, while at the same time creating a platform for the amalgamation of the region’s netball associations to become Hawke’s Bay Netball.
Today, the sports park has evolved to be the home of a wide range of sports and sport clubs. As well as those mentioned earlier, the park is home to Central District Cricket, Giants Boxing, Hawke’s Bay Rugby League, Maycenvale Football Club, among others.
As more sport codes have relocated to the Sports Park, cracks have started to appear with concerns about car parking, ongoing construction of new sport facilities, poor placement of new facilities and lack of cohesion between the two trusts and council.
There have also been concerns that the world class sport facilities developed by Sir Graeme and Bruce Mactaggart could become a future ratepayer financial burden, despite a recent $1m funding package from Pak’nSave Hastings and the trust having a greater focus on revenue generating prospects.
When the dynamic duo joined forces to establish the Hawke’s Bay Community Fitness Centre Trust (HBCFCT), their vision was to create a regional version of the AUT Millennium Institute of Sport, the home of New Zealand’s High Performance Sport.
Sir Graeme, a track and field enthusiast, had successfully fundraised the development of the AUT Millennium facility based on Auckland’s North Shore and could see an opportunity to create regional hubs, with Hawke’s Bay an ideal venue.
Both he and Bruce were recent arrivals to the region and shared a common vision of unearthing world class sport talent in the Bay, as well as attracting major sports events.
Graeme stated in 2021, before the opening of the $32 million Regional Aquatic Centre, that the new facilities will complement the current investments and cement Hawke’s Bay as unrivalled in New Zealand for the scope of its sport and recreation facilities for the community.
Already Sir Graeme and Bruce have pulled off a major coup by signing a five year deal with Swimming New Zealand to host major national swimming events in the FINA Olympic-rated aquatic centre.
Their other contribution has been a 70 bed Sir Graeme S Avery hostel, which is close to being permanently fully booked with athletes and volunteers making use of the Trust’s high performance gym and health science facilities through to the sports park’s other outdoor facilities.
The Regional Sports Park Trust (RSP) has also been active in supporting the establishment of the canoe polo facility and most recently the new indoor training facilities for Central Districts Cricket and the new Giants boxing facility.
However the trust is facing some big replacement costs, with the athletics track at end of life, as are the netball courts.
The RSP trust, which oversees the operations and maintenance of most of the park, deals with most of the user complaints – from car parking, frustration due to ongoing construction of new facilities and maintenance upkeep.
Netball unhappy
Late last year, long-ignored netball administrators decided to take matters into their own hands. Although the sports park spatial plan had started (but had come to a halt), netball decided to undertake a review of the netball sites it operates from – the Pak’nSave Hastings Centre at the sports park as well as netball centres in Waipukurau and Napier.
Hawke’s Bay Netball chair Heidi Oliver says that after 12 years at the Sports Park and on the back of some of the challenges that had occurred due to the sport’s own growth as well as growth of the sports park, it was time to undertake a netball facility strategy.
She says the strategy, funded by Lotteries New Zealand Ltd and undertaken by Visitor Solutions, was to look at future proofing the sport and its centres.“We wanted to understand what, in an ideal world, needs to be done to bring them up to standard for the next 10-15 years.”
She admits that a catalyst to the survey was the issues the netball community faced most Saturdays.
“All users of the sports park have issues with car parking and it is a bugbear of ours which was highlighted during the construction of the aquatic centre where we lost car parks, as well as issues with pedestrian access to our courts. This really did agitate the netball community to say ‘this isn’t good enough’.”
Heidi says it was time for netball to be a strong user voice at the park, especially since the Sports Park Trust has used the impressive 4,000 player numbers to attract potential funders for new park amenities.
“I guess that’s been another frustration (for netball) because when entities apply for funding in regards to the sports park they use the entire sports park user numbers.” Heidi says these are largely accredited to netball.
She says a couple of years ago Hawke’s Bay Netball met with former RSP chief executive Jock Macintosh and chair Tania Kerr asking for a fair share of any funds secured for the park. Little has changed since that meeting, which prompted the decision for netball to undertake its own facility survey.
“We said ‘you are leveraging off netball, yet netball is not being considered in this development’, which is more evident now when we don’t have any visibility.”
“It very much looks like netball has been forgotten about.”
She says today, the Pak’nSave Hastings netball centre is hidden from public view by the Institute of Sport and Regional Aquatic facility as well as the cricket and boxing facilities. A once highly visible facility, can now hardly be seen and is difficult to find.
Another concern is that little design thought has been put into connecting the facilities to each other.
Heidi says the completed survey is an attempt to protect and futureproof netball facilities at the park, whether that be on the current location or elsewhere at the park.
When netball moved to the park in 2011, the surface of the courts was seen as a short term solution. Twelve years on the courts are in poor condition and for the first time ever HB Netball cancelled Saturday games – not just because of poor weather, announcing the cancellation on social media “due to weather, court surfacing, parking situation and ultimately players safety”.
“At the moment the courts are slippery, the line markings and court signage have faded and there are health and safety issues. Although we have had good dialogue with the Trust, little has eventuated.”
Netballers pay to use the courts, but Heidi doubts much of the $32,500 user fee goes into maintenance, which is a responsibility of the sports park trust.
“In an ideal world a portion of the fee we pay would be put aside year on year for repairs and maintenance to help fund the line markings, improve toilets and changing areas.”
Heidi says it’s also difficult for the netball association to fund any improvements and is reluctant to increase player fees.
“We don’t have deep pockets– we are reliant on member affiliation fees, grants and sponsorship funding to sustain the organisation.
“Our research has confirmed that 32% of those who use the park consider the facilities could be a deterrent to their participation.”
Heidi says it’s not too late to ensure the sports park is highly regarded by all users, particularly regular community users, but there needs to be a more cohesive approach to facility development and more investment in ongoing maintenance to ensure existing facilities are looked after.
“That is all lacking and feels like it is very ad hoc. It’s great for Hawke’s Bay to have (the Sports Park) but it’s sort of been ‘we will plonk it here and deal with long term maintenance later’.”
Going forward as the two trusts negotiate a merger, Heidi is unsure whether this will provide better outcomes for netball.
“I do wonder that netball may have had greater traction if we were able to go to council and lobby directly, rather than via the sports park trust. If we had gone through this process again, I think that’s what we would have done – asked to deal directly with council.”
Other voices
Another suggestion is to create a user forum to ensure the voice of each user group is heard.
Hastings Athletics Club chair Sharee Jones is hoping the RSP Trust can quickly find between $700,000 and $1.4 million over the next few months to replace the athletics track as well as install lighting.
She admits it’s a lot of money, but they are not the only users of the facilities. The grandstand, track and inner field have hosted rugby, football, music festivals and New Zealand’s largest Māori culture event, Te Matatini.
Sharee says the small club has little financially to contribute and any increase in user fees would have a big impact on participation. She says the bigger picture of the wider use of the track and field facilities needs to be considered.
The club has focussed on investing in track and field assets such as throwing cages and pole vault equipment, which has helped to secure hosting national events such as the Colgate New Zealand Secondary School Games. It is also the preferred facility for national sprint groups and pole vaulters.
She says the RSP Trust says it is confident it will find the funds, at least for the replacement track, which will help it maintain its reputation with athletes and administrators.
“A new track comes at a huge cost that we certainly can’t fund. We hope that the sports park trust can get the funding shortly and we will have at least a new track by early 2024.”
The lights would add a new dimension that supports twilight events and the potential to try and attract events such as the Oceania Track and Field Championships, but are a nice to have.
She adds the extra facilities such as the Avery hostel, and the fitness and high performance gym facilities at the sports park provide additional appeal to attract major events.
“The hostel in particular has been a great new asset as athletics requires a lot of volunteers, so they can stay in affordable accommodation onsite, while it can also host training squads.
Like other user groups, Sharee highlights parking as an issue, although not to the same level as winter codes, due to it being a predominantly summer sport. The bigger issue is having to share the track and the field area with larger community events such as festivals.
Sharee is also lukewarm on a merger of the two trusts with concerns that they presently have a difference in focus, saying the Sports Park Trust is focussed on grass roots sport and HBCFCT more focussed on high performance sport.
“They need to ensure there’s balance between community sport and high performance, and there needs to be some form of representation of voice for the users.
Merger?
Time is ticking for the formation of a new trust and it has become more complicated due to both trusts presently without permanent chair executives. The Regional Sports Park chief executive Jock Macintosh resigned last year and is now a Hawke’s Bay Regional Councillor while HBCFCT’s general manager David Nancarrow finished more recently.
Acting RSP chair and Napier city councillor Graeme Taylor hopes this will be resolved with a willing counterpart in HBCFCT chair Iain Taylor, as well as strong council influence, although at a Hastings council meeting in May, he said there is a current impasse and he was unsure of when this would be resolved.
At the meeting Graeme said the sports park trust had been more than open with its due diligence information and that the hold up was due to HBCFCT.
“The regional sports park trust is more than open and has conceded and agreed to many of the requests of the community fitness trust, however the matters within their trust are for them to resolve.”
He added as well as the spatial plan being held up, so too is any future appointment of a senior manager to manage the park and the combined facilities.
“The impasse needs to be resolved and I know there’s a lot of people working behind the scenes but until it is resolved I think we are going to be in a hiatus, and some of these decisions are crucial.”
Council’s view, according to deputy chief executive Bruce Allen, is that a transitional arrangement is put in place reflecting representation from both trusts. Bruce says this could be three trustees from each trust along with Tangata Whenua representation.
Bruce has been working with the two trusts on the merger with a heads of agreement signed in September 2022, enabling the trusts to work through a due diligence process.
Initial work included financial forecasting for a combined trust, a draft trust deed which included a set of objectives as well as representation and trustee appointments.
That work went on hold in late 2022. However Bruce won’t go as far as saying there is an impasse between to the trusts, but that it has taken longer than hoped.
“Good progress is being made, although it is taking time to work through.
“It is a complex situation with the foundation trust and another that came to council with huge opportunities with the Sports Hall and future plans, which included an Aquatic Facility which came to fruition. It is just taking some time to work through.
“Trustees need to ensure they are undertaking thorough due diligence and acting in the best interest of their respective trusts.”
Council has been working hard to reignite the merger, so as to complete the spatial plan. It also has set aside $1.5 million in the draft annual plan to upgrade parking and access at the sports park and is also keen to purchase additional land for future extension of the sports park.
As existing sports codes nurture their talent, community participation continues to rise, new sports such as water polo exceed all expectations and high performance athletes are developed into Olympians, it is hoped that the emergence of a new modern trust, not overburdened in political interference, takes the park to the next level.
There’s too much to lose.
Starting like most kiwi kids playing rugby barefoot on frosty Hawke’s Bay mornings, Damon Harvey became a sports editor for the local rag and then a sport promoter for the ASB Tennis Classic, the national rugby championship and the Auckland Blues. He served 15 years on the board of Sport Hawke’s Bay, five years as chair, and continues to be involved in sport governance locally. A third-term Hastings District councillor, in his spare time he’s an action man – surfing, mountain biking, a gym bunny and a newcomer to water polo.