Battle of the football fields

Battle of the football fields

A resolution has been reached over the contentious use of a football oval in Callan Park.

The Leichhardt Council has come to an agreement with the Balmain and District Football Club (BDFC) and the APIA Leichhardt Tigers Football Club over the usage of Leichhardt Oval Number 2 in Callan Park whereby BDFC will have access to the oval.

The BDFC is pleased with the access to Oval Number 2 but would have preferred to have acccess to Balmain Rd oval.

The BDFC president, Brian Frankham said at a meeting in February that the Council kncked down its proposed use of the Balmain Rd oval.

He said the Glover Rd oval, another field within Callan Park, was discussed in the meeting, but Leichhardt Councillor Darcy Byrne raised concerns about the oval’s contamination.

After the Council meeting, the APIA agreed to shift some of their junior games on the oval to allow BDFC partial use of the field.

“There was some deal to get APIA off those Leichhardt fields and offer them to us which we are grateful for and it’s helped us in this season, but we just wished they could have made some [of] these decisions earlier, and they could have given us Balmain Rd,” Mr Frankham said.

The mayor of Leichhardt, Rochelle Porteous was happy with the proposal, saying it satisfied community needs and was respectful of all stakeholders.

The Honorary President of APIA, Anthony Raciti, said the club offered the timeslots as a goodwill gesture.

He said many of the junior players in the BDFC will likely play in the senior leagues with APIA.

“The less facilities you’ve got, the more headaches you’ve got,” he said.

“But we were asked by council to support it, and we thought that as a good faith and goodwill gesture that we [should] cooperate.

“We hope that in the near future when a similar scenario emerges a similar gesture will be put towards APIA.”

The BDFC’s earlier requests to the NSW government gained support but were denied by the local council.

Mr Frankham said: “Council didn’t want to endorse that proposal.”

Leichhardt Council was against BDFC acquiring access to the oval without having first gone through an Expressions of Interest process and said the Balmain Rd oval was not ready for use.

A council spokesperson said: “No sports fields [will] be designated for specific sports and Council wants allocation of all sporting fields in Callan Park to be a fair and transparent process carried out on an equal ‘expression of interest’ basis.”

“Council also wants to ensure that issues such as traffic and parking management and amenity
issues such as provision of toilets and waste collection

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