“The facilities at Inverell have been in play since about 1988,” Mr Dumesny said.

“The generosity of a lot of contractors associated with the club has allowed a job that’s worth about $60,000 to be covered by our funding

“They’re doing that by only charging cost and no profit and putting in a lot of their time. Like the Pay boys here, with the material they’ve sourced and will lay for the club.”

President of the Inverell Trotting Club said Jon Watts said he was very pleased with the upgrade and said the club could not have afforded it at commercial prices.

“Kevin and Darren Pay have been tremendous supporters over the years and they continue to be, and there would be many other sporting bodies in Inverell that would say the same,” he said.

Watts said the club had five full-time trainers so relied on volunteer support. 

“Other than Broken Hill, we would be the second most isolated track in NSW,” he said.

 “We just want to keep the track going.”

Mr Dumesny said he thought the track still had a lot of racing in it.

“While ever the club has the willing workers, the conscientious volunteers, as they do, there will always be racing here,” he said.

“Harness Racing NSW has no intention of closing down tracks like this. While the club’s viable and the people are here to do the work harness racing will be in Inverell, as it will be in all this North Western District.”

Mr Dumesny said Harness Racing NSW would soon make a significant investment in Tamworth.

“At this stage we intend building a new track,” he said.

“The showground there is for sale. If it is sold, we will have to move off that property, so we’ve secured a new property which we will investigate building a new track on. We have the support of the council to do that.”

Mr Dumesny said a process of creating regional pacing centres was underway.

“We’ve completed Bathurst, we’ve moved on to Wagga and after Wagga will be Tamworth, of course. We’re doing upgrades at Penrith, Newcastle and doing some finishing work at Menangle Park.”