Knox City Council Grant to Support Boronia Hawks

Boronia Hawks appreciates the generous support from Knox City Council and Cr Peter Lockwood during the Covid-19 pandemic. We have just received a $1,000 contribution to assist with our facility operating costs as part of Council’s COVID-19 Community and Business Support Package.

The Council has already waived all tenancy fees for the use of the facilities at Tormore and Millers, but we still have ongoing costs for our electricity and gas connections. This funding will assist the Club to manage our costs and remain in a sound financial position going in to 2021.


New Sporting Lights at Tormore Reserve

Tormore Reserve is a leading community facility and the addition of new sporting lights through the great support of Alan Tudge MP, AFL Victoria and Knox Council will ensure that reputation is maintained for many years to come.

The new lights provide an outstanding solution for training and matches.

The four 28 metre high poles, with six lights on each, will give our players the opportunity to train on a top-quality oval with state of the art LED lighting for many years to come. The Club’s vision is to always strive to innovate and improve across all aspects of operations, both on and off the field. These new lights will give us tremendous flexibility in relation to the fixturing of matches for our men’s and women’s football teams.

The previous lights had deteriorated rapidly and were inadequate for training.

Planning for the new lights started in 2018 as the old lights were no longer at the required levels for training, let alone night football. With the support of Knox City Council and Alan Tudge MP, the Club lodged a submission for Federal Government funding under the Australian Sports Commission’s Community Sport Infrastructure Program.

It was a great day for the Club when Alan Tudge announced the ASC’s approval of our application for $190,000 to fund the project. The successful application for further funding of $24,000 from AFL Victoria under the Facility Development Program ensured that the Club’s own contribution to the project was manageable, while still significant.

Alan Tudge MP, Federal Member for Aston, with Boronia players.

The Lights were officially switched on by Club great Kristan Wood, accompanied by three other former Club Presidents, at a ceremony on 29 August.

Former Club Presidents: Kristan Wood, Tim Currie, Frank Carroll and Scott Nicholas.
The end of an era as the old lights are taken down and removed. Photo by Kay Kimmitt.

The Club would like to express out gratitude and appreciation to the following people and organisations for their significant contribution to the successful completion of this project.

  • Alan Tudge MP who was the Club’s supporter in our application for Federal Funding through the ASC;
  • Sue McGill, Director, Community Sport & Infrastructure with Sports Australia;
  • Jessie Doull, Facilities and Planning Manager at AFL Victoria;
  • Jake Keogh, the Mayor of Knox;
  • Councillors Peter Lockwood and John Mortimore;
  • Daniel Clarke and the Leisure Development team at Knox City Council;
  • Tim Gates, Managing Director of Wallgates Electrical Services;
  • Stuart McDonald from Nuvo Group;
  • Kerryn Westcott, the Club’s Grants Manager;
  • Kristan Wood, the Club’s Project Manager;
  • David Nicholas; the Club’s Finance Director;
  • Greg Hannon, Senior Club President;
  • Scott Nicholas, Chair of the Club’s Board of Directors.

Senior President’s Update

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To say our season for the senior men has been a roller coaster would be an understatement.  Thankfully, nearly all our injured players are back on the field and, with three games to go, we should have close to a full list vying for a senior game come finals!

It would be great if as many supporters as possible get down to ‘The Hawka’ over the next two weeks to give our teams an extra boost leading into their finals campaigns.

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Our senior women’s team kick off at 8:20am this Saturday for their final home and away match of the season, before they commence their first finals campaign at Mulgrave on 18 August.  Special thanks must go out to Lace and Snicko (Ray Lacey and Scott Nicholas) for doing a tremendous job coaching our growing list of female players. We began with 9 women last year, but they have built that up to well over 30 this year.  With two junior girls teams, who knows where we will be in season 2020!

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After the senior game last Saturday, the Mulgrave rooms were just full of Boronia people. Probably 80% Boronia in their homerooms!! The senior umpire said to me; ‘The culture you have at Boronia is just amazing.  You have Panda, the Krenn’s at every game and people like Bomma running Coterie – it’s incredible!’  And he is right!

Our 19’s have been incredible with up to 5 eligible players playing senior football in recent weeks!  Our Development team is on top and our senior team is half a percentage point off top spot too! Without getting ahead of ourselves, the Club is well placed to have a fair dinkum crack come finals time!

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Unfortunately, our two netball teams, Hawks and Brown will be hard pressed to play finals this season with only 2 games to go.  The Hawks in Premier Division have won 4 games from 11, with 4 thrillers decided by 4 points or less.  The “Brownies” have suffered from injuries all season and have only managed 2 wins so far.  On a brighter note, over 30 players have played netball with the Club this season, including a number of “cross overs” from our women’s footy team who are happy to double up for the weekend!

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The Vets finished their season under lights in the wilds of South Belgrave last Friday.  The boys kicked on to celebrate the end of their season in fine style, because they played some great footy during the year and welcomed many new players to the Club.  Thanks to Joey, Jason and the boys for another great season.  Success will come!

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Off the field, our new lights get installed at Tormore Reserve this week.  This is a most exciting development and will give our Club incredible flexibility when fixturing matches in future years.  Special thanks to Woody (Kristan Wood) for facilitating this project.  In addition, much work has been done behind the scenes to secure funding for a facility upgrade in the next 2 to 3 years.   We hope to have some meaningful announcements in the coming months!

Please get behind Murra (David Murrihy) and support our finals hosting program.  This is equivalent to a major club sponsorship and we need as many volunteers as possible to make this work!

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We have the Presidents Lunch with Matthew Richardson, which is completely sold out, on August 17 and the vote count night after our last match of the season!  The senior Awards Night is on 4 October and DOES NOT clash with the Vet’s Footy Trip!

The next 7 weeks could be ‘crazy’ busy but get involved and cheer loudly!!

Go Hawka!

Greg Hannon

Senior President, Boronia Hawks Football Netball Club

 

 

Work Commences on New Lights

Work has now started on the new lights at Tormore Reserve.

We will have four new 28m poles, each one carrying 6 lights. For the sparkies, they are 6 Philips Optivision BVP525 LED Luminaires.  They will be a significant improvement for training sessions and will enable us to conduct twilight and night matches.

Many thanks to Alan Tudge MP for his support in funding this tremendous addition to the facilities at Tormore Reserve.

Thanks to Knox City Council for their support with design and construction.

Finally, thanks our Grants Co-ordinator Kerryn Westcott for successfully managing the submission process resulting in our winning the grant; and to our Project Manager, that amazing man of many talents, Kristan Wood!

02.1 - Wallgates Site Plan (Tormore) copy