SACKVILLE, N.B. — The portraits of Sackville’s Sports Wall of Fame inductees may stay hanging on the wall at the Tantramar civic centre after all.
Town councillors unanimously approved a motion at their recent monthly meeting, asking the Sports Wall of Fame board to delay implementation of the restructuring plan for the wall.
The motion came from Deputy Mayor Ron Aiken, who said he simply wants the board to take another look at the options for the display at the civic centre and the space to accommodate future inductees.
“I just want them to delay the implementation and give it some second thought,” said Aiken.
Town council approved changes to the Wall of Fame last month, following up on a recommendation from the board to switch the 13x18 charcoal drawings of the inductees with smaller 8x10 plaques.
Matt Pryde, Sackville’s manager of recreation programs and special events, explained at the time that the display at the Tantramar civic centre has been getting a little short on space and the board has been discussing how to accommodate future inductees.
Under the previous governance guidelines, the inductees would receive a plaque in recognition of their achievements in the sporting world while a sketch marking their contributions would adorn the Sports Wall. This new change would switch up that process.
But Aiken said council had been receiving “considerable push-back and commentary” from the public since the decision last month, none of it positive.
He decided to pay a visit to the civic centre, where he took some measurements of the mezzanine area where the portraits are located.
“There’s about as much room on the back wall of the mezzanine there as is currently devoted to the Sports Wall of Fame. So you could effectively double the size of it without making any changes in protocol,” he said.
Aiken said he’d like to see Sackville stick with the charcoal portraits, as they are a unique feature for a Sports Wall.
“I know of nowhere else that does this sort of thing and it’s nice to keep something like that,” he said.
Coun. Mike Tower agreed with his colleague, saying he hopes the board and council can find a way to keep the portraits.
“It’s our sports history and we’re honouring them and I think we should keep them there as best we can,” he said. “I like the idea that we can keep this tradition going.”
Tower said it may take some out-of-the-box thinking, but he believes it can be done.
“If nothing else, this has really brought the conversation forward so that we get more input and possibly much better ways of doing it.”
Coun. Joyce O’Neil said she has also been hearing concerns about the proposed changes, mainly from participants in her 50+ aerobics class.
“These are people that know Sackville and know people that are on the wall and are pleased with what they’ve seen up there so far,” she said. “So they’ve encouraged me to just ask that we take another look at things and hope that we can continue in the way we’re going,”
Coun. Andrew Black said while he had seen a lot of comments and opinions expressed on social media about this issue, as a councillor he had only received a total of three emails and staff had received two, both from the same person.
He urged citizens to be wary of misinformation or conjecture on Facebook or other social media sites and to instead reach out to “the people who know what’s going on in Sackville.” He said the emails and phone numbers of staff and councillors are listed on the town’s website.
“If you have a question or concern about something going on in town, whether good or bad, get the right information directly from the source,” said Black, adding that those concerns would then be directed to the appropriate representative who could address the issue.
“Get your voice heard by the people who can make a difference, your elected officials and competent town staff,” he said.
Coun. Shawn Mesheau pointed out that he had received comments from a number of people about the changes to the sports wall, and even took the ones he saw on Facebook into consideration.
“I take to heart anything that is read online,” he said, “and I take it with a grain of salt.”
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