Murray and Heather Salt will cut the ribbon at the official opening of Te Puke Sports' new grandstand next week.
Murray and Heather Salt will cut the ribbon at the official opening of Te Puke Sports' new grandstand next week.
It was always going to be a big project - but it turned out to be bigger than anyone imagined.
Late in 2017, Te Puke Sports and Recreation Club got their hands on a few hundred seats that used to grace the sidelines at Christchurch's Lancaster Park.
The club applied to buy the seats from the earthquake-damaged stadium after Christchurch City Council advertised they were on sale.
The plan was to get them to Te Puke and build a stand around them at Murray Salt Stadium.
It's taken longer than expected, and cost a lot more than was first thought, but the project is now nearing completion with an official opening next week.
''When we first kicked it off ... we thought the grandstand would cost us somewhere in the vicinity of $200,000,'' says project co-ordinator Rick Hannay, ''but as we developed and as we worked with Letts [Construction] we realised that if we were going to do a grandstand, we wanted a lifetime grandstand, not something that is going to be partially wood that would deteriorate.
"So we've gone for the best and the materials that are being used are lifetime materials.''
The final cost will be somewhere in the region of $800,000.
There has been a lot of ancillary work that has been done, including changing the rear of the club rooms to make the area more user friendly, and extensive earthworks.
''Murray Salt and others have donated a heck of a lot to the club in terms of earthworks, machinery skills and builders and concrete layers. It has still come at an extra cost, but the blow-out relates to improvements in the club and the grandstand, not miscalculations.
''The support we've had from the business community, related in many cases to horticulture, has been absolutely superb.''
Te Puke Sports officials celebrate the arrival of seating from the old Lancaster Park in 2017.
Photo by Jamie Troughton/Dscribe Media Services
Rick says rural companies that do business in the Te Puke area such as Rabobank, Seeka, First Mortgage Trust and Growsafe have pitched in.
''Our club is based in the heart of the world's kiwifruit industry, and as a consequence of that, the businesses that do business in this area have recognised that a lot of our members are farmers and orchardists.
''We've also had companies like Stratum and Arnold and Johnstone, who are professional structural people, who have worked to make sure this building is safe and is planned correctly. They have pitched in at basically no cost to us, so we have been very lucky in that area.''
There have also been funding contributions from TECT and NZCT, but Rick credits Te Puke Community Board as the supporter that ensured the project got off the ground.
''They put in $60,000 at the starting point, then Western Bay (of Plenty District Council) started to top that up, so we will forever be indebted to the Te Puke Community Board for saying 'yes' to this project.''
Club members ''purchased'' individual seats and then Seeka was the first commercial sponsor to come on board.
The need for new supporters' accommodation was highlighted by the visit of the Argentine Hindu Sports Club in early 2017 when the old wooden stand was full.
''We saw that our old stand was just totally inadequate,'' says Rick.
While the club hopes the new stand will help attract bigger games, the emphasis is on the community use of the club's grounds.
''This is a community grandstand and we want to see community sports played here and community events - charity events, whatever they may be - this grand stand is for them - this is for Te Puke - it's not just for Te Puke Sports, this is an open club and we want to keep it that way.''
The new grandstand will be officially opened on December 4 with an afternoon of celebrations including junior rugby, kabati, performances from school groups and a ribbon cutting by club stalwarts Murray and Heather Salt.
In the evening there will be a more formal function featuring guest speakers Ian Kirkpatrick and Eric Rush and an auction which, among the items up for grabs, will be a pair of boxing gloves signed by Joseph Parker, TJ Perenara's All Black jersey, a wall-hanging mural depicting the history of Te Puke Sports and a portrait of, and signed by, Ian Kirkpatrick by Bay of Plenty artist Patrick Gibbons.
