Guelph/Eramosa pickleball courts move ahead after budget shock

Guelph/Eramosa kept its pickleball project moving on June 22, but only after trimming the scope and accepting a cost that climbed far beyond the original $562,000 budget for the courts and a multi-use pad.

The lowest tender for the first version landed at $1,243,809 before HST, a figure that pushed council to defer the job on June 9 and 10 and tell staff to negotiate with Bomar Landscaping Inc. Parks and facilities manager Jeff Myer returned with a scaled-back plan that cut the price to about $792,945 before HST, still roughly $230,000 over budget.

For players, the key question is what they actually get for the extra money. The answer is four new pickleball courts, plus a package of site work that had been part of the broader plan, including shade structures, higher fencing, extended pathways and additional seating. The more expensive version also had included a Rockmosa asphalt multi-use sport court with basketball markings, two nets and design allowances for future seasonal ice-rink boards, but council stripped back non-essential items and dropped the multi-use court to get the project closer to something it could approve.

That left a narrower but still costly build. Staff said the original budget had been based mainly on court surfaces and did not include detailed design work, and preliminary planning showed the first concept would not meet expected use or accessibility and operational needs. Staff also estimated about $100,000 could be saved by handling some provisional items in house, including tree planting, water services and electrical work.

The funding gap on the June 10 report was about $681,809, with reserves and possible grants expected to carry the load. Those sources included the Rockwood Hydro reserve and the Dolime Fund reserve. Mayor Chris White and Coun. Corey Woods both pushed for the project to come back toward the original budget, and council ultimately backed the reduced version rather than kill the courts outright.

The township had already made the case for more dedicated pickleball space earlier in 2025, when council asked staff to look at three to four new courts at Marden Park and Rockmosa Park because demand for pickleball was said to far exceed demand for other uses on a multi-use pad. The project also sits beside other recreation spending in the township, including six new beach volleyball courts opened at Marden Park in July 2025 through a separate partnership with Perpetual Motion Sports.

For local players, the result is not a grand redesign but a practical one: the courts are still advancing, the playing space is still expanding, and the price tag has become part of the story.