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July 13, 2007

Funding Enables Expansion at Athy Rowing Club

Athy Rowing Club, established in 1997 was awarded Є12,500 from the 2007 Sports Capital Programme which is managed by the Department of Arts Sports & Tourism. In addition to this the club will also receive an additional Є3,750 from The Department of Community Rural & Gaeltacht Affairs under the RAPID Leverage Scheme.

The club also received Sports Capital funding in the 2005 programme.

The application for the funding was submitted in October 2006 and the announcements were made in March 2007.

The total funding now available to the club is Є16,250. Over Є4,000 has been raised by the club as the total cost of the equipment is almost Є21,000. An amount of Є16,900 was sought from the Department so this was an excellent result. It is also an indication of the quality and completeness of the application. The club received a lot of support to prepare the application both from RAPID and the Kildare Sports Partnership.

The then RAPID Co-ordinator, Linda Mulhall, met with us regularly while we were developing the proposal and provided advice, liaison with other agencies and finally supported the application at RAPID AIT endorsement stage. This is a very important process for groups in RAPID areas in terms of the Department’s general assessment of the proposed project and is also part of the qualifying criteria for the additional funding from the RAPID Leverage Scheme.

Kildare Sports Partnership ran a practical information workshop in Athy when the fund was advertised. Two members of the club attended the workshop and got a lot of ideas on how to approach the application process. The KSP were also available for continued support following the workshop and fully supported our application.

We are delighted that we can now go ahead and purchase new equipment including:
2 single rowing boats
1 Safety Launch

Between the two grants from the Sports Capital Programme and RAPID and other grants from Kildare Sports Partnership and the Regional Drugs Task Force, the club can now boast a good coaching programme delivered with high spec equipment. Our membership has increased and our younger members, in particular, are rowing very competitively at national level.

 Training Sessions are held at Rathstewart opposite Bachelors every Saturday and Sunday mornings 10 am untill 12 :30, all welcome.