Town council agrees to help fund curling club chiller replacement

By Ian MacKay

Town council has agreed to help the curling club pay for replacing its chiller.

The agreement with the curling club on capital expenses—which had expired, said Amanda Bors, the acting chief administrator—had a clause that the two entities would agree in advance to any cost-shared capital upgrades. However, councillors ultimately decided to overlook that during their Jan. 19 meeting.

“Basically, they changed the chiller and they’re asking us to fund it,” Mayor Trevor Hay said during the meeting. Under the former agreement, “We generally offer up to $10,000 on a capital project on a 50-50 cost share,” Hay said.

After some discussion, councillors passed a motion to contribute $10,000 “from the 2025 financial year” to help pay for the chiller that the club bought in 2024.

Club executives made two requests for help in paying for it, in mid-October 2024 and last Nov. 17, a letter signed by Rosetown Curling Club president Don Campbell noted.

“Having a clear decision will help the curling club to plan responsibly and move forward with certainty as we manage our operations and budget,” the letter said. Campbell also suggested an annual meeting with councillors to help “strengthen our relationship as a regular user of a town-owned facility.” Councillors thought such a meeting should happen in early fall.

Previous capital projects carried out with the town’s financial backing have included new upstairs windows, flooring, lighting, heaters, emergency exit stairs and exterior tin siding, Hay and recreation director Kelli Emmons recalled.

The club has paid for the chiller and would like the town to pay $10,000 over five years to help restore their account balance, Emmons thought. The club has over $400,000, raised when its members were considering building a new curling rink, councillors learned.

Councillor Kimiko Otterspoor said, “It doesn’t matter too much what they have, how they’ve done it or what they’re going to spend it on; I think it’s more of what we as a council want to support.”

While the old agreement instructed the town to approve spending on a curling club project in advance, Otterspoor thought the town should change the agreement “and offer to help them with projects over multiple years,” she said.

A line to the chiller was damaged when the town was doing other work, “and we did end up paying for the repair,” Emmons said. The previous chiller had an expected life of about 22 years; the chiller was 19 years old, she thought, “and I think they questioned whether us hitting that line affected the chiller,” she said.

Councillor Greg Carlson suggested making a one-time payment of $10,000 toward the chiller, “even though it wasn’t predicted and a set-up project,” and councillors soon passed Carlson’s proposal.

With the current agreement over, Bors suggested that council consider revising the next agreement.