Corner Brook -
The Corner Brook Minor Hockey Association is about to lose its midget division.
Last year, the Corner Brook Midget Minor Hockey League had a 30+ kid registration with the program costing $480 per player, totaling over $14,000 in revenue.
Those who signed up for the house league would be able to play on the Corner Brook High School team and also have the right to play on the provincial team. Those who did not register with the Corner Brook Minor Hockey Program would not be able to play on the high school team and they would not be able to play in the provincial Easter tournament.
This year, Hockey Newfoundland and Labrador withdrew their support from the high school programs, resulting in a big drop in numbers in the midget division.
There were only 12 kids who joined the midget hockey program in Corner Brook this year, with a $70 increase from last year, so 12 x $550=$6,600. They lost over $8,000 from last years revenue for the midget division.
Even though they were faced with this problem at the beginning, they didn't act on it to bring up the registration for the minor hockey association. There was no plan put in place to deal with the low numbers.
Two Executive members of the Corner Brook Minor Hockey Association have sons who are midget players but are not registered with the Corner Brook minor hockey. This is because their kids are playing hockey with the high school team and the triple A team.
This year, with HNL withdrawing their support, you don't need to be registered with the association to play hockey on the high school team or the major midget triple A team.
Their kids didn't enroll in the very program that the committee members are supposed to be supporting.
The coach of the high school team is also the midget vice-president. None of his players on the high school team are registered with the minor hockey program. So here you have two members of the board who are not supporting the association, and the midget vice-president who has done nothing to support the Corner Brook Minor Hockey Association.
Now, there are only 12 players in the midget hockey program. The midget vice-president (also coach of high school team) decided without any consultation to bring the high school team to practice, after two practices I argued that they did not pay their registration, they should not be on the ice, they then stopped coming to practice.
Just before Christmas, the midget vice-president asked the bantam A team to practice with the 12 midget players on their two hour ice time once every week on Thursdays. The bantam A team had 17 players on it, the midgets only had 12. They halfed both teams equally to create two teams.
As games went by, we figured out that our kids lost an hour of their two hour ice time slot each week.
The bantam A kids played our kids' ice slot and our kids couldn't play their ice slot. After three practice games, six kids quit the midget division, that left only six kids who had paid their registration now playing in the house league.
So, we have two association members who have sons playing hockey that are not registered with the association, and still able to play in the Corner Brook Minor Hockey midget tournament, and the midget vice-president who is also the coach of the high school team who has none of his team registered with the minor hockey association.
Aren't the actions by these people directly responsible for the loss in numbers from the midget division? If these 12 kids had to pay registration to play for the midget league, the other players from the high school and major midget teams should be required to pay as well or not have been picked for the team.
Since the Corner Brook Minor Hockey Association midget A team was picked last week, three of the six kids remaining from the house league were picked for the team and three were cut, my son being one of them. In previous years, the way it worked was that you had to sign up for minor hockey and pay registration in full before January.
Also, you had to show up for all house league practices and games to be able to practice for the A team. The fact that my son was one of only six remaining players who paid registration, and was one of three who did not get picked is wrong. All of these registered players should have automatically been chosen for the team. The midget vice-president/coach is going to have two high school teams in place of a now troubled Corner Brook minor hockey midget division. This will result in upwards of $15,000 in registration fees lost annually from not having a midget division.
