The District of Houston and the Houston Curling Club have worked out a deal which in effect reduces the amount of money loaned to the club by the District.
It stems from a situation dating back to 2018 when the club’s ice-making plant failed a safety audit with the result that its operating permit was null and void.
In the same year, the ice-making plant at the District’s Claude Parish Memorial Arena was also declared deficient, leading to the need for a replacement.
Province-wide inspections of ice-making plants were ordered following the deaths of three people from an ammonia leak at the Fernie arena in Oct. 2017. The local plants were not the only ones declared deficient.
With the District arranging for a replacement plant for the arena and the determination by the curling club that a replacement at its facility would be cost prohibitive, the District and the club agreed to a plan. Because the club and the arena are so close together, an underground connection would be made between the two so that the arena’s plant would feed into the curling rink.
To avoid having the curling club having to find the money to pay for the work all at once, the District proposed to loan the club $80,000 with an annual interest rate of 1 per cent over a 20-year payback plus a user fee of $4,000 a year.
That proposal never made it to a final agreement because of staff turnover at the District.
At the same time, costs for the arena replacement that ran over first estimates delayed that project as did the arrival of equipment, pushing back the ability to put in ice until late 2019. The curling club was then connected in early 2020 after a year and a half of having no ice.
And now, a memo from District of Houston finance director Jennifer Larson released publicly at the Oct. 4 council meeting lays out the final provisions of the loan agreement and that of a grant provided to the club.
The loan is for $88,885 which reflects the cost of the connection from the arena to the club. The interest rate is 1 per cent over 20 years and, to offset operating costs, $400 a month during the time ice is in at the curling rink.
Parallel to the loan agreement is an agreement in which the District is providing a grant of $15,666.47 to the club.
“During council discussions earlier this year, the option of providing a COVID-19 grant to help offset some of the payments was suggested,” Larson stated in her memo.
“The recommendation that was approved by council was to provide a grant to offset costs up to March 31, 2023 in order to assist the curling club with re-establishing normal operations that had been canceled during the COVID restrictions.”
The grant of $15,666 covers the period of loan payments and user fee payments called for from Oct. 2020 to March 2023.