6th April 2024 was a beautiful day in Foxton Beach with blue skies and no hint of wind. This provided a perfect backdrop to the official opening of the new Foxton & Beach Bowling Club clubhouse and green. A stark contrast to 2nd March 2022 when the entire club, its honours boards, trophies, and all other contents, were destroyed by fire caused by an electrical fault.
It would have been entirely understandable if club members had decided that a rebuild was too hard. But they didn’t. They circled the wagons and made collective and considered decisions to get another clubhouse back in place quickly and this culminated in the official ribbon cutting and opening of the new clubhouse, complete with karakia on site, on the afternoon of April 6.
What has transpired at Foxton & Beach Bowling Club is an incredible story of sheer grit, determination, and camaraderie. Club members were unwavering in their support for decisions from their board and the building subcommittee that was set up quickly after the fire. Cleverly, the club looked to members with building experience to advise the board about the building process and associated costs. At the same time, no time was wasted in engaging with insurers to get the necessary approvals and release of funds to assist with replacement facilities. The subcommittee also looked at pre-existing buildings as part of the overall solution and a suitable prefabricated hall was found in the Hawke’s Bay and transported on site as part of stage one of the project. All the while a major clean up of the land and greens took place as the fire caused asbestos to be released over the site and therefore requiring a more extensive clean up than normally expected. Stage two of the project was to extend the original building placed on site and finalise the gardens and surrounding seating etc. Sadly, one of the original subcommittee, Bruce Harris. passed away two weeks ago and did not get to see the community celebrate the opening.
A new clubhouse is now in place within two years, as indicated by the subcommittee, and under budget. A terrific success story celebrated in great heart with a wonderful meal coupled with loads of laughs and dancing into the wee hours. It is fair to say there was a lot of love in the house and an opportunity for those that had toughened out the hard yards to let their hair down and let some of the stress experienced move into the realms of history.
Club President, Allan Shannon, described the generous outpouring of help, facilities and money following the aftermath. There were planned fundraising initiatives, online initiatives through GiveaLittle and other projects to help bring the new facilities to light. Other speeches were made by Kerry Johnston from the Foxton & Beach building subcommittee, Chris Lander of Bowls New Zealand, President of Bowls Manawatu Grant Pratt, and Tracey Macrae, Secretary of Foxton & Beach Bowling Club. It is fair to say there were none too many dry eyes in the house after hearing about the dark days, the hard work, and the loss of beloved club members during the project.
There is no doubt that Foxton & Beach Bowling Club is well poised for a great future. An inspiration and shining example to any club or community group for how to mitigate disastrous events and rise again from the ashes.
