For whatever reason, recreation can be a hard sell.
Take the groups trying to get a multi-use turf recreation facility off the ground here in Yorkton, who will meet again this week. They have a hard road ahead of them, because they’re selling recreation when there are plenty of sensible things to spend money on. There is the promise of a new hospital on the horizon, there is the city’s constant struggle to stay on top of aging infrastructure, there is the general feeling that everyone should be very sensible with money right now.
They have done a lot of work already and are prepared to do more, but they have a hard sell, and their biggest barrier is going to be convincing people that this is a good idea.
But should that be the struggle? Even if a recreation facility seems frivolous, it is a draw, it is a place that could lead to spin-offs like sporting tournaments coming to the city. And in all honesty nobody has ever decided that they would not move to a town because there was too much stuff to do.
Money is limited, of course, but given the number of people who complain that the recreation options in town are limited, it seems like they should get more encouragement, especially as they set their sights on corporate sponsorship.
Their struggle, then, should be getting the money together, not convincing people it is a good idea. And that should be our perspective as well. Go forth, user groups, and see what you can do. We should encourage them, instead of dismissing the idea out of hand.
The slogan of this city is “Where Good Things Happen.” What about great things? Those only happen when people work together to make them happen, sometimes even ideas that seem impossible at the time. It’s healthy to introduce some skepticism, because it makes the people with the crazy idea work harder to make it make sense. But we shouldn’t dismiss their ideas entirely, because if they convince enough people, they aren’t so impossible anymore.
Will this turf facility happen? Who knows, it’s so early anything can happen. But we should still be positive about it, because if they pull it off, it’s a feather in the city’s cap. And if they don’t, we at least had a group of passionate people working together, and they could achieve something else for the city down the line. Being a pessimist about it gains you nothing, we need the people with a dream, whether it comes true or not.
