Spokane Valley Opens Four New Pickleball Courts After Years of Overflow Demand at Balfour Park
- Spokane Valley finished four new pickleball courts, a full basketball court and two half basketball courts at Balfour Park this summer, backed by a $673,000 state grant and $300,000 in city funds.
- The city has now put $6 million into Balfour Park through a renovation that started in 2024, with $4 million more already lined up for a 2027 playground and splash pad.
- Parks officials say the neighborhood around the park, where about 750 households live below the poverty level, had waited years for this level of investment.
Courts That Couldn’t Keep Up With Demand
For a while, Spokane Valley ran temporary pickleball courts at Balfour Park. City Councilman Ben Wick said demand for the sport had grown too fast for players to wait on permanent construction. That wait ended late last month, when thousands of people showed up to celebrate the completion of four new pickleball courts, a full basketball court, two half basketball courts, upgraded sports lighting and a new sound system at the park, located at 105 N. Balfour Road. The courts are open to the public year round, and the new lighting means play can continue after dark. Splitting the basketball space into one full court and two half courts gives the park room for pickup games of different sizes running at the same time, alongside the four dedicated pickleball courts next door. Together, the additions turn a corner of the park that once relied on temporary setups into a permanent, multi-sport hub. The celebration itself drew a crowd large enough to fill that new space. Thousands of people turned out late last month for the opening, a turnout that reflects how much use the temporary courts had already been getting before construction crews replaced them with something built to last.
The new courts are one piece of a larger rebuild. Spokane Valley has been expanding and upgrading Balfour Park continuously starting in 2024, according to Parks and Recreation Director John Bottelli. The city has spent $6 million on the park so far, and it already has $4 million more set aside for construction planned in 2027. Bottelli’s title puts him at the center of that work, coordinating a park that has moved from temporary fixes to permanent infrastructure over roughly two years. The pickleball courts represent the most visible result of that shift so far, replacing a stopgap setup that Wick said the city built to answer demand that had outpaced the old facilities.
A Grant-Funded Build in a Neighborhood That Needed It
The newest additions to Balfour Park came from a mix of public funding: $673,000 from a state grant and $300,000 from the city’s Capital Improvement Program one-time funds, city spokeswoman Jill Smith said.
Roughly 13,000 people live within a mile of the park. Bottelli said the median income level in that area sits below the state average, and around 750 households there live below the poverty level. Those figures are part of why city officials describe the investment as overdue rather than simply timely.
“Balfour has for a long time served that part of the community and there’s a great need there,” Bottelli said.
The city bought the 8.3 acres for the park, across the street from City Hall, in 2012. Nearly everything built there from that point forward, including this summer’s courts, has come together through the same pattern: state grants layered on top of city capital funds rather than a single large allocation.
What the New Sound System Means for the Park’s Future
Wick said he was especially excited about the park’s new sound system, which uses wireless microphones and can be split to play different announcements or music in three separate areas of the park at once. The city already tested it out at a Cops and Cruisers event.
“We used it for Cops and Cruisers,” Wick said. “We were able to make announcements, do raffles and drawings and connect with people across the park. In the future, when we have markets and things, we can make announcements or have music played.”
“It’s phenomenal,” Wick said.
Wick, who also serves as president of the Spokane Valley Kiwanis Club, said his group plans to put the sound system to use next summer at Outdoor Movies in the Park. The Kiwanis Club has a long history at Balfour Park already: it led the original fundraising that helped establish the grounds decades before pickleball existed as a sport most Americans had heard of.
More Building Ahead: A Playground, a Splash Pad and an Amphitheater
Spokane Valley plans to build a new playground and splash pad at Balfour Park in 2027. Bottelli said the city already has $4 million lined up for that work: $500,000 from a Washington Wildlife and Recreation Program local parks grant, $2 million through the land and conservation water fund, and $1.5 million from the city itself.
The city has also finished grading a section in the northwest corner of the park for a future outdoor amphitheater, one more step in a master plan that now stretches from sport courts to performance space. None of these projects have a public price tag or construction date attached yet, unlike the 2027 playground and splash pad, but the grading work shows the city is already reserving the land for it.
“Our goal is to have a place for a symphony to be able to play out in the park,” Wick said. “It’s trying to create events for the community and providing a space.” That amphitheater goal points to where the park is headed beyond sport. Pickleball and basketball courts solved an immediate demand problem this summer, but Wick’s comments suggest the city sees Balfour Park’s next phase as a gathering space for the wider community, not just athletes.
A Park Built by the Community More Than a Century Ago
Balfour Park carries a longer history than its new courts suggest. It’s named for John W. and Annie Balfour, who homesteaded the land in 1914. John W. Balfour died in 1955. The park got its start through fundraising led by the Spokane Valley Kiwanis Club and was created by the Opportunity Recreation Council, beginning with just two and a half acres. A sprinkler system went in back in 1950, though it didn’t actually run until 1953, according to Spokesman-Review archives.
That slow, grant-by-grant expansion is still how the park grows today. The pickleball courts arrived only after the city ran informal, temporary ones to keep up with players who kept showing up faster than construction crews could build for them. The playground, splash pad and amphitheater are next in line, funded piece by piece through state grants and city dollars rather than a single windfall, the same way the courts themselves came together from a $673,000 state award and a $300,000 city contribution. A park that started with two and a half acres in 1914 is still being built out piece by piece more than a century later, one grant cycle at a time.
For now, the four new courts are open and free to use, day or night, with the lighting installed this summer. Players who used to squeeze onto temporary courts at Balfour Park have a permanent home, and the city says more of the park is still coming. Spokane Valley didn’t wait for a single big grant to build the pickleball courts. It set up temporary courts first, watched the turnout, and then committed real money once demand made the case for something permanent. That sequence, informal courts proving the need before permanent ones get funded, is now built into how the city is planning the rest of Balfour Park through 2027 and beyond, from the splash pad and playground to the amphitheater Wick described.
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Image: Depositphotos
