Emergency flood fund available

People cleaning up and repairing sports pitches and facilities destroyed by Storm Desmond can apply for new National Lottery funding to help them get back up and running quickly.

Sport England has created a special £200,000 emergency flood relief fund to help restore pitches and repair sports facilities damaged by the rising water and gales.

The funding is available to sports clubs, local authorities and other community sports organisations to help pay for emergency repairs to damaged facilities such as football, rugby and cricket pitches, water sports centres, pavilions, changing rooms and floodlights. Financial support can be provided in as little as three weeks.

Jennie Price, Sport England’s chief executive, said: “We appreciate that sport isn’t a major priority when people’s lives, homes and businesses are at risk. But once communities are starting to get their lives back to normal, being able to use their local pitch or sports club as usual can make a real difference. By launching this fund quickly to help with clean up and repair costs, I hope we can give people affected by the floods one less thing to worry about.”

Work that will typically be funded includes:
• Grass pitch restoration
• Clubhouse decontamination and repairs
• Replacement of damaged/condemned electrical systems
• Steam cleaning, de-silting of drains.

Sports minister Tracey Crouch MP said: “The floods have had a devastating impact on communities and the primary focus for many will be to try to get back to normality. This fund is just a small part of our wider package of support for affected areas – by helping restore sports facilities to their former glory, it will help to slowly rebuild the lives and everyday routine of these communities.”

The Emergency Flood Relief fund is open to applications now, but will close at 5pm on Monday 1st February 2016. To see if your club is eligible go to www.sportengland.org/floodfund

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A graduate of Cardiff University’s highly respected post-graduate magazine journalism course, Andy has successfully edited four different publications across the B2B, trade and consumer sectors. He is skilled at all aspects of the magazine process in addition to editing websites and managing social media channels.