Two Donegal projects will benefit from the allocation of €130,000 sports funding from the dormant accounts fund and Sport Ireland.
The allocations were made through the Donegal Sports Partnership which has provided sports facilities countywide in recent years.
Two projects have received funding approval, they were: Maghery Coastal Adventures Project, Dungloe was allocated €35,000 and the Bluestack Foundation was allocated €73,000 for the provision of a sports hub.
Pat the Cope Gallagher welcomed the funding, saying: “The Donegal Sports Partnership which were the lead group in this application have proven themselves again to be an excellent group in sourcing funding and promoting sports facilities within our county and all credit goes to the personnel in the Partnership for their work.”
Pat the Cope added that the two projects who received funding will serve their respective communities well. He paid tribute to the organising committees and promoters for leading out and obtaining this funding.
“The Maghery project previously received €113,000 in earlier rounds of funding, this recent allocation will support the continued employment of a local co coordinator, which in turn will build additional local capacity across the 6 identified sports and sustain the programme for the greater benefit of the local communities.
“The Bluestack foundation allocation will assist in developing a second sports hub in Donegal, the project seeks to provide children, young people, and adults with disabilities and their families with opportunities to participate in sport and physical activity.
“The overall programme will also provide opportunities for capacity building for sports clubs in south Donegal which is most welcome news,” he said.
Pat the Cope said while the Sport Partnership Model works extremely well, more needs to be done by national government in providing additional resources.
“More and more national reports have indicated that more exercise and physical activities need to be engaged in by our youth and adult population but in order to provide the much need facilities more grant aid needs to be provided to our communities.
“The Government need to provide additional resources and use this existing model for project and programme delivery in the years ahead, what is urgently needs is a multi-annual programme of funding which would set out a road map for further delivery of facilities such as these throughout our rural communities,” concluded Pat the Cope.
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