After nearly three years of stalled plans and funding rejections, the Chapeau Recreation Association (RA) will be using a $100,000 grant secured last fall to begin long-needed upgrades to its facilities.
The RA plans to use the provincial development grant, awarded by the MRC Pontiac, to implement a three-phase plan that will involve building a pavilion, tile draining the waterlogged ball and soccer fields, and upgrading the ball diamond netting.
“It’s been years since we’ve used the field since it’s taken on so much water,” said Karie Bissonnette-Sullivan, RA member and former president, who has been working on trying to get the soccer field repaired for over five years.
The soccer field has been out of commission for at least as long, and has not been used safely for more than 20 due to its poor drainage and tendency to hold onto large amounts of water. The drainage was so poor that a study conducted several years ago found aquatic life growing on the field.
“We’ve been working in collaboration with [St. Joseph’s] to make sure that [soccer] continues, but in the future we’d like to have it back here,” she said.
While the ball field’s condition is not as dire, allowing continued community use, this year’s soggy spring kept players off the pitch into early June.
The first phase of the project will be building the 30-by-40-foot pavilion structure between the swings and splash pad in front of the Lions Club, which Bissonnette-Sullivan said is important to bringing much-needed shade to the field. Construction for this will begin this month.
Phase two will involve ditching and tile draining the soccer and ball fields, but this work cannot begin until the RA receives final engineering plans for the holding tank that will need to be installed under the field to ensure the drained water doesn’t put more stress on the neighbouring properties or public sewers. Bissonnette-Sullivan assured drainage work on the ball field will not begin until late fall after the season is complete.
The third and final phase of the project will involve upgrading the ball field netting and fencing.
“$100,000 doesn’t go a long way,” said RA treasurer Karolann Gauthier-Roussel, noting the pavilion alone will cost $70,000.
The municipality has donated $18,000 to the project, conditional on its completion. Bissonnette-Sullivan predicted the project will continue through 2027, which will allow time for further fundraising needed for its finalization.
The current project is a scaled-down version of a more ambitious proposal the RA first submitted for funding in Nov. 2023, which requested $250,000 and included a walking trail to tie the various components of the park together. That application was denied.
After several application attempts the RA was awarded a more modest grant in Sept. 2024 through the province’s Regions and Rurality Fund, administered locally by the MRC.
“There have been a lot of setbacks,” Bissonnette-Sullivan said, referring to not only the two denied funding applications, but the unforeseen challenges regarding where exactly all the diverted water will be sent.
“There’s lots of wheels and pieces to the puzzle.”
But the RA team isn’t giving up, and is still working to find funding to one day fulfill its original vision for the space, walking paths and all.
