Work to improve the conditions at the Austin baseball diamonds has put a pause on the community's annual softball tournament. However, with work continuing, the hope is they will be back and in better shape than ever for next year.
Brad Giesbrecht, the Vice President of the Austin Community Centre board, notes why the decision was made.
"So right after COVID opened up, we saw that it was very important that we updated our diamonds because we've seen nearly 100 applicants sign up for rec ball. So, we had baseball going on every night of the week. After that, I believe that was in 2022, we'd seen the same kids come through, and then parents decided that they wanted their kids to be involved in more minor ball, a little more serious than rec ball. So, in 2024, they decided to start up the North Norfolk Minor Ball Association, and we quickly realized that our diamonds were in serious need of upgrades. They met baseball Manitoba requirements, but just barely," he continues. "We formed a committee with several large donors and some people like Karla Gurke at Heartland Recreation Commission, as well as several other members of the Austin Community Center and then just local volunteers. And we came up with a plan to bring our diamonds to life again."
Giesbrecht says the final plan is to have diamonds that are functional for all age levels.
"Our goal is to make 3 playable diamonds. Two of those diamonds will work for senior ball to peewee ball, and then the third diamond will be left without a pitcher mount, so it'll work for 11-and-under, as well as fast pitch."
He adds that the project has several areas they are keying in on to improve the facilities.
"We're also putting brand new dugouts on all three diamonds. Currently, what we're doing is, last fall, we tore up all the diamonds. We took them to the existing fences and the backstop, and we got in the grader and levelled the entire field to grade so that it drained properly. This spring, we put in grass seed, and we're currently waiting for the grass to pop up so we can mow it. And once it's established, the plan is to get fences around the diamonds. And then once the grass is further established, we're going to get some infield gravel on diamond one and two. Sometime in there, we'll be building dugouts, putting dugouts on all the diamonds, and bleachers. And then, next year, we're looking at getting scoreboards."
Giesbrecht shares that this project's goal is to see high-level baseball played in Austin for years to come.
"Next year we're hoping to have baseball full swing again, and final things to do next year are hoping to improve our bathroom, put in an announcer booth between Diamonds One and Two that would be suitable for hosting provincials or hosting different tournaments where they can watch the two featured diamonds. And then getting scoreboards, whether that be manual scoreboards that we go and put up. Or ourselves or electronic scoreboard. The Yeah, the big kind of goal of the the whole project is that we'll be able to host provincials and host tournaments to give back to North Norfolk in a big way."
He adds that it seems everyone in the area is happy to have the work being done.
"The baseball community has been really excited about it."