Welcome to Ratoath Community Centre
Ratoath Community Centre was opened in September 2006, the current community centre building is the third generation community centre in Ratoath.
St Olivers Community Centre CLG is a not-for-profit community organisation. It is a registered charity and has as its core objectives the advancement of the arts, heritage, education, culture and community welfare as well as greater community participation in sport and physical activity. SOCC is governed by a voluntary Board of Directors and managed by a Chief Executive and employs over 20 people as well as indirectly providing main employment to over 40 additional people in class and service providers.
Grants
We have been fortunate in recent months to have been successful in a number of State Grant applications which is enabling us in the period October 2022 through to April 2023 to undertake a significant upgrade of our facilities after sixteen plus years of their pretty intensive use.
Our first investment has been in new seating for our theatre. This installation was completed in early October and increases our capacity to 244 seats. The new seating was installed by an Irish company, Allied Systems & Products Ltd., the cost was almost €65,000 and we wish to acknowledge the decision by the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport & Media, Catherine Martin T.D. to award us a 70% grant up to €49,000 under the Department's Cultural Capital Scheme, part of Project Ireland 2040. We are currently undertaking additional investments that will enable us to offer our community a new Cinema facility in 2023 and new energy efficient LED lighting.
We will be making additional investments to upgrade our upstairs Venue Studio that will enable us to put on smaller shows at weekends. Grants have also been secured from Meath County Council and the Department of Rural and Community Development which will help fund refurbishment and upgrade works to our community centre facilities.
Our next major expansion project will be the construction of a new Community Sports Campus Hub Building and if you have not yet visited our community sports campus, then please do so and you will see at first hand a model community sports development with a multi-sports campus of the highest standards situated adjacent to Ratoath College. Our new Astro Pitches are now being used by local sports clubs, fitness classes and Ratoath College. Also we have just completed a €50,000 investment in building a new entrance that accesses all sports centrally, a new viewing area and a new emergency entrance for accessing the lower pitch / track levels.
We are also continuing to put in place the foundation stones that will enable us to broaden the diversity of arts featured in our facilities and we see the new investment in our upstairs Venue Studio as being a major milestone on that path. New groups have been established in more arts disciplines through 2022 and these will feed into an expanded programme in 2023. We want to acknowledge the ongoing support of local volunteers and the partial funding received from the County Arts Office in Navan, both of which enable us to continue to pursue this expansion programme.
We invite you to have a more detailed look around our website and perhaps you are not fully aware of all the various activities that we undertake. We have made all the necessary changes and improvements to ensure that all our facilities and services are operated in as safe a manner as possible and that all visitors to our facilities feel as safe as possible in relation to Covid-19.
