The proposed Dubbo Sporting Hub has just recieved a further $23.3 million in funding

Member for Dubbo Dugald Saunders, Deputy Premier Paul Toole, PCYC NSW CEO Dominic Teakle and members of involved sporting organisations were present at Charles Sturt University on Thursday for the official announcement.

The world-class, state-of-the-art facility received an additional $23.3 million to get the project up and running.

Dubbo Basketball has been one of the sporting organisations which have been patiently waiting for the project to happen and club president Hale Gordon is excited to step foot in the facility once it is completed.

"We've waited a long time to have this project executed and we are very excited to move forward," he said.

"We are excited to help the development of not only our children but the children of everyone else in the region to provide a quality facility and environment to develop their skills and as people."

READ ALSO:

The project was announced back in 2018 and Saunders knows it has too much time has passed getting to this stage.

"This isn't about trying to find excuses, this has taken too long and there is no doubt about that but today we set a new line in the sand and say 'we are building this project'," he said.

"There were two years of COVID which made getting deals done that needed to be, there was also a reality around the project. The site wasn't as easy as what was first thought, the site needed salinity tested and other tests.

"It all took time and money, we needed to re-scope to find what was wanted by the community, particularly for basketball.

"They had been knocking on the door about this for a long time to make sure we actually provided a number of courts for a sport that is there for the future."

Dubbo Basketball will be just one of several sports the indoor facility can cater for with netball, gymnastics, indoor hockey, volleyball, futsal and badminton also in the plans.

PCYC will move their Dubbo office to the site which will feature a reception, kitchen, admin space, police area, youth hub, learning room, boxing and fitness gym plus three multi-purpose rooms.

"We are a community organisation, we are a charity first and foremost, that participation increases because we are not-for-profit," Teakle said.

"We won't refuse entry for anyone, we work with a lot of organisations across our portfolio where we have big basketball associations integrated into our program.

"What happens is you leverage their expertise to run projects for kids who are disadvantaged."

Saunders and Toole also confirmed regardless of the results of the upcoming state election, the project will go ahead.

"This is money in the bank, it's about delivering a project for the community and it is the right thing to do," Toole said.

For now, Saunders said the project still has a few more hoops to jump through before the construction officially gets underway.

"The next steps in the phase of this are literally getting all our final works approvals done, they will be DAs (development applications) that need to be approved," he said.

"We will go out to tender so we can find the right builder, I'm hoping there will be a local builder with local contractors involved. If you look at how things are happening across Dubbo and our region, things are pretty tight at the moment.

"It's about finding the best possible builder who can do it in a timely manner and at the best possible price, hopefully, it is local but that will happen in the next couple of months.

"We want to fast-track this as much as we can and Public Works will be driving that and I will be driving Public Works to make sure we are achieving all the goals we need to as quickly as possible while making sure we do it right."

As for the outdoor section of the sporting hub, Saunders confessed he had been in talks with rugby codes and other sporting clubs about what could be added to stage two of the site.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: