KTC CLUBHOUSE AND COURTS RESTORATION

The Kingston Tennis Club, founded in 1924, has been the social centre of Kingston's tennis community for almost 100 years. The club provides recreational and instructional tennis opportunities in a casual residential setting to anyone in the Kingston community, from the very young to those well past retirement age. The not-for-profit community club welcomes members and guests for regular games, competitive match play, monthly club tournaments, and regional school tournaments. The club has seven courts, five of which were upgraded in 2020 and outfitted with LEDs for night play; there is a spacious lawn for casual socializing, and the small, historic two-storey clubhouse with adjoining decks allows further socializing while enjoying views of the courts.
The clubhouse restoration and expansion – the largest capital project the club has undertaken since the 1920's – will retain the look and the feel of the old clubhouse while adding innovative and modern upgrades and amenities. The club office will be moved from the second floor down to the deck to improve interaction with the membership and our guests, and to dramatically open up the second floor to create an expansive new space for social and camp activities. The ground floor change rooms will be completely renovated and expanded to make them more functional and attractive, and an accessible change room will be added to complement the newly accessible lower deck. A new glass-clad outdoor staircase will provide access to an enlarged upper deck which we envision will be used extensively by members and guests. Finally, the two courts adjacent to the clubhouse will be resurfaced and repainted, and the hitting wall will be rebuilt.

The estimate we have received for the total project cost is $954,000, including $831,000 for the clubhouse renovation and $123,000 for court improvements the following year. The fundraising goal is $150,000, by far the largest capital campaign in the club's history. Fund-raising will be an essential part of our financing plan which will also include a bank loan and current cash on-hand. This large investment will complete the much-needed improvements to the KTC facilities, allowing the club to once again focus energy and resources on programs and services tailored to the needs of our diverse membership. A top priority, for example, is improving and expanding junior development programs in addition to continuing our popular summer camps for children.

At the heart of this capital project is the almost 100-year-old clubhouse whose functionality, amenities and comforts are not up to the standards of a modern tennis clubhouse. The redesign and expansion of both indoor and outdoor spaces will create an exciting new clubhouse dynamic without altering the 'good bones' of the existing building. It will set the stage for future generations of Kingston amateur tennis players to experience the joys and friendships that have defined our small club and the wider Kingston tennis community, and for more young players to take their first steps towards regional and national competitions, and athletic scholarships.

The full amount of the $150,000 raised through our fund-raising effort over the coming year will be directed towards the Clubhouse and Courts Restoration project. Elements of this $954,000 project are the following:
• improvements to change rooms, washrooms (including accessible one), large upstairs gathering room
• rebuilding and expansion of upper and lower decks
• resurfacing and repainting of two adjacent courts, and rebuilding of hitting wall.
• extensive improvements to the building's structure, insulation, wiring and plumbing, windows and doors.
• as part of the renovation, the building will be insulated to render it more comfortable and welcoming during the tennis season and to enable KTC to extend the tennis season with a later closing of the club and earlier opening in the spring. The building will be better protected during the winter off-season (December – March typically).

The KTC was the first – and currently the only – tennis club in Kingston. Many regional and local tournaments have been held at the club since its inception, including annual KASSAA and EOSSAA tournaments, annual club championships, and open houses sponsored by the OTA. The KTC also provides annual training facilities for the varsity tennis teams (male and female) of Queen's University.

Our fund-raising drive will be greatly facilitated by enabling us to provide charitable receipts to our donors. By leveraging charitable status to attract these important lead gifts from dedicated members and community stakeholders, we will able to invest in this keystone project, building facilities that will endure for many decades to come.

With a modernized clubhouse and high-quality courts, the KTC Board will continue its mandate to make the sport of tennis accessible to all age groups and all socio-economic income levels in the community, directly serving around 500 members annually as well as hundreds of campers. As we have in the past, we will maintain fees at an affordable level for players of all backgrounds and we will promote the sport in the wider community with our junior programs and clinics open to members and non-members alike.

We have a lot of turnover among our younger members growing up at KTC, as they pass through local schools and Queen's. Afterwards, they spread out all over Canada and will take their love for tennis with them wherever they go.