Township applies for federal funding to fix Thornton Arena
Posted August 8,
2012
Essa council disrupted its summer recess for a special meeting August 2
to confirm the Township would apply for one-third eligible funding from
the Community Infrastructure Improvement Fund to pay for major upgrades
to three decades old Thornton Arena.
The proposed project would be carried out in two phases with the first
replacing the ice service at an estimated cost of $425,000; And Phase 2
would include a new machine room at cost of $405,000 to be completed
next summer.
A report from Essa consultant, Ainley and Associates dated December
2011"identifies the methodology that can be used to upgrade the arena
refrigeration system by converting the existing system from Freon/brine
to a more environmentally friendly ammonia/ethylene glycol system. The
approach is to do the work in two phases, with the rink portion (Phase
I) being done first and then the machine room (Phase II)."
The Community Infrastructure Improvement
Fund that will provide $49.6M over 2 years to repair
and improve existing community infrastructure facilities that
are non-commercial and are accessible to the public. Each recipient can
get up to $1 million and must be prepared to leverage 50 per cent of
the funding from
other sources of revenue. In Ontario, priority will be given to
projects that require a Federal contribution of just 33.3 per cent of
the total project cost. Project construction must be completed by March
31, 2014.
