Help Save Balmain RC Historic Shed

Published Tue 06 Aug 2019

Balmain Rowing club shed is perhaps the oldest rowing shed in Australia, being established in 1882 and still being used today. In 2007 the Balmain Rowing Club community came together under the leadership of Don Croot with a program to restore and refurbish the existing boatshed, extend its storage facilities and upgrade amenities both for the general and rowing community. Since 2009, BRC has had all the drawing documentation in place and received all the required council approvals to make this project happen. 

Approved plans can be viewed either via the club website or the restoration plan. 

The total cost of the rebuild is around $2m with additional costs forecast due to the amount of work required over water. Due to the shortfall in club funding capacity and the costly nature of the work involved the project has been scheduled to be done in stages. 

Balmain Rowing Club is now looking to the public and rowing community for assistance. An eligibility criterion as part of the Community Building Grant asks for the Balmain electorate to vote in favour of this project. If you live in the Balmain electorate (Annandale, Balmain, Balmain East, Birchgrove, Camperdown, Forest Lodge, Glebe, Leichhardt, Lilyfield, Pyrmont, Rozelle or Ultimo) then Balmain Rowing Club is looking for your vote (and anyone else you can gather) to get this stage of the project over the line. There are only a few competitor projects under this grant application, and $260,000 is up for grabs in the Balmain area, so there is a good chance that the club could secure the funds if we all lodge our votes together.

How to vote
The process can feel a bit confusing at first but a few things to note might help:

  1. Anyone in your household over 16yrs can vote before 11:59 pm AEST Thursday 15 August.
  2. You can click here to get started - https://www.nsw.gov.au/improving-nsw/projects-and-initiatives/my-community-project/.
  3. Voters don’t need to be directly associated with BRC or the rowing community to vote, so friends in the area and neighbours can also vote.
  4. You will need your Medicare card as an age check. The process is more comfortable on a computer than a smartphone.
  5. You will need to log in with (or create) a MyServiceNSW account for each voting person.
  6. You'll need to use an electorate suburb in the address field to bring up your BALMAIN state electorate. You don’t need to put in your whole street address, just a suburb in the electorate (Annandale, Balmain, Balmain East, Birchgrove, Camperdown, Forest Lodge, Glebe, Leichhardt, Lilyfield, Pyrmont, Rozelle, Ultimo).

Thank you from Balmain Rowing Club
A vote for this project is a vote for rowing
Joe Grech
President BRC