What’s in this email?
1) Club member Jeanne Harteau has opinion piece published
2) Wickenburg Pickleball Club needs old paddles
3) Courts needed to be resurfaced because of continuous play
4) Angie Robinson has accepted the position of Ladder Manager
5) All Court Nets have been raised on the bottom
6) First Annual Pickleball Holiday Lights Golf Cart Parade
1) Club member Jeanne Harteau has opinion piece published in the December 11 edition of Surprise Today. “My View: Venter misses mark with pickleball arugment.” The article is available online.
2) Wickenburg Pickleball Club has just gotten 6 new courts and is now taking on the project of teaching in their local schools. They are badly in need of paddles that are no longer being used and sitting in garages. If you wish to donate your paddle to school education, please contact Linda Hoggatt 623-398-8937.
3) Court Resurfacing: I’ve been hearing a lot of rumors as to why the courts need to be resurfaced. The PB courts were rebuilt in October 2012 ,and they were not scheduled for resurfacing until 2017. The SCG PB courts are used daily from 7 am to 9 pm, they get continuous play, they wore out because of use. Please stop the rumors about the ball being the cause. CAM staff saw this as a safety issue and they have expedited the need to resurface the courts. The only other choice was for me to start closing courts until the 2017, scheduled resurfacing. We have 3 courts I would have been forced to close next week, with others to follow.
If you want to play pickleball, the City of Surprise has 8 courts open for play while the SCG courts are closed for repair beginning this Friday 12/18-12/24.
So please stop spreading rumors as to why the courts need to be fixed. It’s from a high density of use .
4) Angie Robinson has accepted the position of Ladder Manager. Please give her your support. She is seeking help with the Captain’s responsibility for C Ladder. Please contact Angie if you might be able to help.
5) Court Nets Raised: We raised the bottom of the net on court 5 last spring as a test per the requests of many members. Most other pickleball facilities, including the City of Surprise Courts, have their nets raised on the bottom. The feedback has been overwhelming positive and we have found the court was much easier to clean as well. So we asked and received permission from CAM, as the nets are community property and not the Club’s, to raise the nets in all the other courts. With the coordination of Fran Flanagan and her hubby Rich, this was achieved yesterday afternoon without interfering with court play time. We would like to thank the rest of the crew, Joe Williams, Sue and Dan Perry, Bill Wong (not even a club member), Lorin Stern and Bob Ellis for their hard work.
6) Golf Cart Holiday Lights Parade: Last night the Club had its first attempt of meeting up at one central location (Apache Room) and then going out in a parade of golf carts admiring the decorated homes and neighborhoods within Grand. It was a big success for being our first one, with many carts really decorated and some members dressed very festive. Please see the pictures that have been posted on the Facebook page, Grand Pickle. After a tour of Grand we came back to the Apache room for coffee, tea, hot chocolate, goodies and good conversations with other members. We would like to thank Laura and Keith Darrow, for organizing the event, planning the route and leading the parade around Grand. Hopefully this new Club tradition will continue to grow in the years to come. Again, our Club leads the way in Grand.
Dennis Raggi
SCG Pickleball President