The national lottery funded sports capital programme, which is administered by my Department, allocates funding to sporting and community organisations at local, regional and national level throughout the country. The programme is advertised on an annual basis.
The 2004 sports capital programme was advertised in the national newspapers on 30 November and 1 December 2003. The closing date for receipt of applications was 16 January 2004. A total of 1,304 applications were received before the closing date, seeking a total of €253.22 million in funding for projects estimated to cost €508.38 million. A total of 30 applications requesting funding of €6.16 million for projects estimated to cost €14.53 million were received from County Sligo and a total of 27 applications requesting funding of €4.62 million for projects estimated to cost €7.57 million were received from County Leitrim.
All applications received prior to the deadline are currently being evaluated against the programme's assessment criteria, which are outlined in the guidelines, terms and conditions of the programme. I intend to announce the grant allocations for the programme as soon as possible after the assessment process has been completed. I do not propose to provide details of individual applicants until the assessment process has been completed and allocations have been made.