Club using grant to make boats ship-shape

The St. Catharines Rowing Club held its annual Captain’s Dinner and Awards Night Saturday.

And the icing on the cake this year was the nearly $70,000 in funding the club will be getting from the province.

The club recently learned it has been approved for a $67,200 capital grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

With the funding, six eightperson rowing shells will be completely retrofitted and upgraded. The work will be done during the off-season and, once the upgrades are complete, the boats will be used mostly for the club’s Youth Rowing School and Adult Recreational Rowing League.

The shells are expected to be ready for the 2019 season.

“The upgraded boats will ensure that St. Catharines athletes have the opportunity to learn and row in the best of most up-to-date equipment possible,” rowing club president Michelle Kerr said.

St. Catharines MPP Jim Bradley and Livia Martin, the chairwoman of Trillium Foundation’s Niagara grant review team, attended the Captain’s Dinner delivering congratulations.

“The club’s Youth Rowing School and Adult Recreational Rowing League support the theory that rowing is a sport for life and that it encourages safe, fun physical activity for all ages,” Bradley said.

He pointed out as many as 50 rowers will use the upgraded shells each day of the rowing season.

“St. Catharines’ decision to upgrade these shells is a testament to their goal to ensure all who row have an opportunity to use safe, high-standard equipment.”

High school rowing is getting underway at the club. Athletes from Niagara high schools will be competing in such events as the Early Bird and Mother’s Day regattas. The high school rowing season culminates with the 73rd annual Canadian Secondary Schools Rowing Association championships taking place

June 1-3 on Martindale Pond in St. Catharines.

Information about St. Catharines Rowing Club, including the youth rowing and adult recreational rowing, is available online at www.stcatharinesrowingclub.org. The Ontario Trillium Foundation, an agency of the provincial government, is one the largest grant-giving foundations in Canada with a budget of more than $136 millon.

Upwards of 1,000 projects receive grants annually.