Some parents want to make sure their children get all the things they had when they were younger, but that desire may been taken a little too literally for Abbotsford families involved in local sport.
Wait lists, aging facilities and in many cases having to leave town are all a common reality for families with athletes across Abbotsford.
Take Abby Mercier – she grew up in Abbotsford as a rep-level fastpitch player competing at Exhibition Park and participating in a number of other sports as a teenager. She eventually left Abbotsford in 2014, moved to Vancouver and then returned to Abbotsford in 2021 – only to discover to her dismay that she is now taking her children to the same places she used growing up, with few (if any) improvements.
"I found the same outdated facilities I used as a child with no new infrastructure in sight," she told council on May 27.
Mercier, a local registered massage therapist, said it felt like jumping back into the past when she began getting her children involved in sports. She noted that in many cases the situation is actually worse, such as fastpitch, which no longer has the access to Exhibition Park she had as a child. Swimming and pool availability is also a crap shoot for everyone involved. She added that ice rink access is also a challenge.
"I kind of had my head in the sand with two young kids when we first moved back," she said of her return in 2021. "My husband works out of town so a lot of the time I'm a solo parent. Just signing up for swimming lessons was a challenge and then I was blown away by how terrible our pools are. They're cold, my kids were uncomfortable and now that my son is five he can't go into the women's change room with me so we're kind of just shivering and waiting for a family change room – it's like trying to get into a Taylor Swift concert."
It was through those frustrations that Mercier took to Facebook to see if she could find any like-minded individuals and her initial post on a local page drew dozens of comments from people echoing her dissatisfaction with local facilities. The post also drew immediate interest from North Vancouver transplant Brooke Kuyer. The former NCAA Div. 1 field hockey player and current physiotherapist arrived in Abbotsford in 2016 and said part of the reason why she's speaking up now is that she believes the community-minded people here deserve better.
"There's a massive community of really passionate people that want the best for everyone," she said. "Nobody is out there saying baseball should get this or only football should get this – everyone is saying that everything needs to be better for our kids, seniors and for the health of our community."
It was through that spirit and that initial interaction on Facebook that Mercier and Kuyer went from strangers to fast friends and then decided to form the Abbotsford Recreation Advocacy group. They began spreading their message on social media accounts and then launched an online petition calling for investment in recreation infrastructure. That petition is ongoing and has close to 3,000 signatures since it was created.
The duo, who spoke to council on May 27, have been meeting with local sports groups consistently and also had a separate meeting with Mayor Ross Siemens last month. They expressed a desire for Abbotsford to commit to new projects as soon as possible. The last new major recreation centre project the city undertook was the Abbotsford Centre in 2007, but that facility is now managed by the Aqulini Investment Group and occupied for much of the year by the Abbotsford Canucks.
The pair noted on social media that Abbotsford is falling behind neighbouring communities like Chilliwack and Langley in terms of new recreation opportunities. The Langley Events Centre complex alone, when upgrades are completed next year, will have more ice arenas than all of Abbotsford. Locally there are only two public rec centres (Abbotsford Recreation Centre and Matsqui Recreation Centre) compared to similar-sized communities like Kelowna (four), Delta (six), Langley (four) and North Vancouver (four).
The pair stated that a new rec centre with the ability to cater to several groups is at the top of their wish list.
"What we think we need is a multi-sport hub," Kuyer said. "A swimming pool with an arena attached and an indoor track so that you can host tournaments. It would be a massive scale, but in the short term every single club has needs that could be met sooner. There are just even some basic safety concerns that aren't being met, for example, railings on the steps at Rotary Stadium. You also have fastpitch that is forced to store equipment far away from where they have to play and there are even some teams in sports that refuse to come here and play because our fields and facilities are low quality. Embarrassing is the word I get when I speak to some sports presidents and it's sad because we have elite athletes here."
Timing is also an issue, as the pair pointed out during their meeting to council that recommendations to improve MRC from the 2005 master plan have still not been implemented. The pair believe that a lot of discussion and studies are done, but not a lot of work actually gets followed through on.
They stated that the 2016 Official Community Plan also pointed out that fields are poor quality, again without anything being done to solve those problems. Similar issues were pointed out in a 2015 report on swimming pools and again nothing has been done to alleviate those issues.
Kuyer admitted that the hopes of her and Mercier could prove costly, but that Abbotsford's physical and mental health as a community would drastically improve with more options for recreation. Those improvements could lead to less congestion at the hospital and when trying to find a local doctor. They also stated that investment could lead to more tournaments, tourism and dollars coming to Abbotsford. Both Langley and Chilliwack typically host far more sports tournaments than Abbotsford due to better facilities and more availability.
The four recommended call to action points by the pair to council were: secure land and zoning approval for a new indoor rec centre, establish concrete timelines for these improvements, engage directly with local clubs and establish a recreation advisory committee. The pair received a long ovation after that initial presentation, which lasted about 15 minutes.
Mayor Ross Siemens thanked them for the presentation and then chose to provide some context on the issues surrounding funding.
"In 2011 the city's net financial assets were minus $17 million and we have worked very diligently to the point where we now have some healthy reserves at about $382 million and that is earmarked for sewer, water, roads and parks and infrastructure," he said. "So we are saving money to put towards these large projects. When we were doing the OCP for 2016 we also identified a need for a water source, a new fire hall and a new emergency operations centre and a police building – some major public safety buildings that we had to secure."
Siemens said those building plans are well underway and the 2021 flood challenges for Abbotsford were much more significant than neighbouring communities. Freeway widening and other road improvements are also big costs coming along. Arena strategy is something that the City is hoping a private partnership will help out with and they believe that swimming is in a much better spot than they were.
"We ask for some patience," Siemens said. "But your advocacy and passion that you bring is appreciated and welcome."
He added that the year ahead will see some answers and their goal is to advance those timelines. But he pointed out that Abbotsford does not have the industrial base that many other communities have and tax increases are challenging to local businesses which are heavily export-based.
Shortly after the pair's petition was launched, the City of Abbotsford announced an application to create a new sports and recreation park at King and McKenzie roads. A public hearing on that proposal was held on June 24.
Mercier and Kuyer stated it's a good step, but are worried that other concerns will not be heard.
Mercier and Kuyer plan to keep the pressure on both the city and sports groups to come up with solutions and encourage the public to follow them on social media – @abbyrecadvocacy.
