Sports fans are continuing to desert Angus sports centres in what has been a mixed year for the arms’ length body in charge of the area’s sport and leisure venues.
Despite a visitor total of more than 2.8 million across sites including pools, sports centres, libraries and museums, memberships of the Angus Alive bACTIVE scheme have recorded another dip.
Changes to the scheme were widely criticised in 2017 when sports including five-a-side and seven-a-side football were excluded from the monthly payment.
Since then the bACTIVE tally has dipped from 9,493 to 8,067 memberships last year.
The 2019 sports centres attendances figure of 1.476m was down from 1.613m the previous year.
The charitable organisation admitted to facing a “challenging environment” but hailed rises in other areas of its operations.
The latest annual Angus Alive report reveals library visitors rose 26,000 to almost 360,000.
Countryside adventure visitors jumped 37,000 to 765,000 and a busy programme at the area’s main theatre, the Webster Memorial in Arbroath, brought in an extra 1,000 people to raise the curtain to nearly 39,000.
Museums, galleries and archives, which includes the Meffan in Forfar and the Signal Tower in Arbroath, welcomed 45,000 visitors through their doors, but that figure was also down on the previous 12 months.
The body’s net income was £415,000, which is transferred annually to the council’s recreations renewal and repair fund.
Angus Alive chief executive, Kirsty Hunter said: “Of course it’s our ambition to increase numbers using our facilities year-on-year and see all our areas achieve an increase in attendances.
“However, charities like ours are operating in an increasingly challenging environment with increased competition in terms of offering and price.
“We are determined to continue to generate income for reinvestment and diversify our funding streams so we can keep offering a fantastic range of services and activities to keep our important culture, sport and leisure services available for people to enjoy today and in the future.”
She added: “The ability of the charity to generate net income to perform regular equipment refresh and replacement is essential.
“The programme of work helps ensure our facilities and services are maintained to high standards as well as improving the digital offering for our customers.”
The 16th year of the popular Angus Glens Walking Festival, the addition of a sixth community sports hub in Forfar as part of a sportscotland community initiative and full accreditation for all five of the area’s museums have also been highlighted as successes of the past year.
