SPORTSPEOPLE in Okehampton claim a lack of safe lighting in the Parklands sports hall, which was opened less than two years ago, is leading to many activities being cancelled or curtailed. Stuart Lord, from OCRA (Okehampton Community Recreation Association) which co-ordinates many of the town?s sporting events said he felt ?let down and disappointed? by the failure of centre operators Leisure Connections to make swift repairs to lights. Leisure Connections say the problem should be resolved by the end of this week. The issue came to a head at a recent community badminton session ? the first meeting of badminton players in Okehampton after a summer break. The bottom two courts could not be used because several of the hall?s lights were not working. Mr Lord said: ?We had a number of new people coming along for the first time. Unfortunately, the night turned into a disaster with many people leaving early.? He said the failure to resolve the lighting problems had hit other sports with league netball and basketball having to find alternative venues. Mr Lord said: ?A lot of work goes into arranging sport and making it accessible to everyone. People are often travelling quite a long way to take part, so it is disappointing when there are problems with the facilities.? Wendy Raymond, netball league organiser, described the current situation as ?laughable?. She said: ?We are using the old college sports hall at present for our league matches. My biggest bugbear is lack of communication from the borough council and the operators.? She said there had been little choice but to find an alternative venue for the netball season when it began earlier this month. ?It was too dangerous. There is no way we can play such a fast sport without proper lighting.? Mrs Raymond said a problem with one of the overhead lights had first been identified at the end of last season, back in April, but the situation had got worse in the intervening months. She added: ?Okehampton Netball League has been running for around 30 years and we have more than 20 teams now ?We just cannot afford to have to keep finding other places to play our matches throughout a 30-week league. It is inconvenient.? Parklands Leisure Centre was opened almost two years ago. It cost £4.2-million with the bulk of the money coming from a Sport England grant. Parklands Leisure Centre said electricians were due to visit the centre today (Thursday) to carry out work to resolve the problem. Okehampton Town Council discussed the issue at a meeting of its parks committee on Monday. Councillors agreed to write a letter to Leisure Connections supporting OCRA?s position and calling for the facilities to be restored to good order. Cllr Tony Leech said he supported OCRA and noted that the swimming pool at Parklands had also been out of action recently while a mechanical fault with its moveable floor had been remedied.
