The pandemic is giving the city of Morden a chance to tackle several things on its 'To-Do' list when it comes to its recreation facilities.

Community Services Director Clare Agnew says they're using some of the downtime created by COVID-19 to completely replace the brine line system (refrigeration lines) in the floor of the Huron Windows Corporation Arena. She says it's a big job.

"It requires us to take out the floor and the boards, but by replacing the brine lines now, everything will be brand new with people get back to skating in September."

Arenas and other recreation facilities have been shuttered this winter due to the pandemic situation. Agnew says replacing the brine line system has been on their radar for some years and now seemed like a good time to get this project done.

"That line has been there for a long time. We have had some problems in other years with leaks where we had to either find the leak or put in a solution that would patch it from inside the line. We could see that we were on borrowed time with that system, so it was certainly time to address it."

Agnew says it takes about three months to complete this kind of upgrade and acknowledges it would have been challenging to pull it off in a normal year with hockey continuing into April, high school graduation in June and the Corn and Apple Festival in August.