Support growing for fund contest

From left, Gillis Cox, Dylan Fillier and Robert Littler are young tennis players who enjoy the sport. (Goodwin photo)

The Highland Tennis Association is well on its way toward accumulating enough votes for a contest offering funding for its proposed tennis courts in Pictou.
As of last Friday, the association needed just 30 more votes to reach the 225-vote threshold by Feb. 17 in the Molson Coors Community Cheer contest.
It would allow the association a portion of the $1 million the brewery is offering in support of more than 20 community projects.
The association’s total was 24th among the 64 projects in the contest.
Its supporters hope to build two tennis courts on land allotted for them in Broidy Park.
“I am very optimistic that we will be building tennis courts this summer and confident that we will be able to reach the vote threshold,” association member Margo Hilchey said.
Groups that accumulate 225 votes will have their projects evaluated based on criteria that include the vote totals and the projects’ positive social impact on the community and ability to demonstrate success.
“We definitely meet their main objective of promoting active lifestyles and have a high probability of being one of the 20 projects funded,” Hilchey said.
The sport is being kept alive with some indoor tennis programs.
One link is the Town of Pictou which was chosen by Tennis Canada to participate in a program called Building Tennis Communities.
The town received funding for tennis instruction and equipment for three summers at the Pictou Academy gym.
The equipment provided included portable nets, and rackets and balls of various sizes.
This allows for the instruction of progressive tennis in which participants select the ball and racket size according to their skill level.
“It allows for much greater success for someone new to the sport,” association member Hilchey says.
Events have also been offered for adults to try the sport during the winter for the last two years, with instruction provided through school programs.
“Now all we need are outdoor courts to play on,” she says.
A fundraising drive has raised more than $72,000, more than half the amount the association needs to build the two new courts at Broidy Park.
Several students at West Pictou Consolidated School have taken advantage of indoor tennis instruction.
“I’d like to have a membership,” Robert Littler said while anticipating the construction of a new outdoor facility.
Meanwhile, Gillis Cox and Dylan Fillier have enjoyed the school’s indoor program, as well as the outdoor facility where they live in Scotsburn.
“We played spring, summer and fall, Cox says.
It’s good instruction,” Fillier says. “It’s fun to play with friends.”