Parasport Games land in Niagara
The 44th Ontario Parasport Games are coming to Niagara in May 2025.
The event will run from May 29 until June 1 and will feature 400-500 athletes competing in 10-plus events. Facilities used will include Canada Games Park, Brock University and the Vale Health and Wellness Centre in Port Colborne for sledge hockey.
“We are extremely excited to continue to advance the legacy of the recent Canada Games in Niagara,” said Doug Hamilton, a board member of Sport Niagara. “Hosting sporting events like this will continue to support sport tourism and economic development in Niagara.”
Three-time Paralympian Jeff Tiessen, a 12-time participant in the Ontario Parasport Games, is leading the steering committee for the Games.
“Niagara has such a rich parasport history and I’m excited for these Games to create even more adapted sport opportunities for individuals with disabilities,” he said.
Neil Lumsden, Ontario’s Minister of Sport, was pleased to select Sport Niagara and Niagara as the successful bid to host the Games.
“These Games are an exciting opportunity for highly skilled athletes to come together in competition with their peers from across the province. The event will provide a significant impact for the local economy, boost tourism, create jobs, and inspire a new generation of athletes,” he said.
Dan Kennedy, Sport Niagara’s director of operations, said hosting the Parasport Games is part of a new direction for Sport Niagara.
“Originally Sport Niagara was here to be a kind of a resource for those who wanted to bring events in and not necessarily an organization that wanted to go out and actively bid on them,” he said. “I told the board that maybe that is a mistake and maybe we are missing an opportunity.”
The board agreed with Kennedy’s thought.
“In looking what was available, I saw the Parasport Games and I thought that might be the right fit as a starter event because it is not as big as some of the other ones that we have done. It is only four days long and it might be a good test to see if Sport Niagara has the facilities and wherewithal to do it without other support.”
The Games have traditionally been held in Durham because that region has been the only bidder and also had the infrastructure to handle the event.
“Now with Canada Games Park and Brock being so close, we actually have the resources to largely put it on in St. Catharines by ourselves,” Kennedy said.
The 2023 Games in Durham required 340 volunteers and Kennedy hopes the volunteers for the Niagara Games will largely come from the parasport community. Sport Niagara is working with Tiessen to connect with all the parasports groups in the region.
“We are hoping this event will be run by the parasports organizations for the para athletes as much as we can.”
Sport Niagara will help to provide training to the volunteers.
“We are going to give them an opportunity to cut their teeth, as it were, as much as possible.”
Kennedy is excited about the legacy portion of the event.
“We are hoping that any surplus from these particular Games will go into a Niagara parasport legacy fund. Sport Niagara will have oversight of it but it will be managed by a group of people from the para community. They will dictate how that money is delivered to the para community at large. It also has more legs if people can donate to it yearly and the para community can apply to get access to those funds.”
Durham estimated the 2023 Games produced almost $900,000 in economic interest and Kennedy projects that number to be around $1.5 million in 2025 if the Games can attract 400-500 athletes.
“We expect to have good turnout because it is somewhere new and Niagara is a hotspot for sporting events right now. We are going to get a lot of people who want to come down to Niagara,” he said.
The sports to be contested in Niagara have yet to be determined. Traditional events such as wheelchair basketball, sledge hockey, goalball and sitting volleyball are expected to be staged but other sports will be added depending on the amount of athletes able to participate. Durham had a number of demonstration sports at the 2023 Games and Niagara is hoping to stage weightlifting, cycling and golf as its demonstration sports.
The Ontario Parasport Games were first held in Cambridge in 1975.
