Petrolia ice times to get second look

Heather Wright/The Independent

Petrolia will take a second look at the way its divvied up ice time this year after complaints senior hockey leagues are not being treated fairly.

Recently, Julie Bullock, director of parks and recreation, completed the schedule for all the ice users.

The town had received a request from Petrolia Minor Hockey Association to try to create larger blocks of prime time ice to “provide flexibility to the growing program.”

When the schedule was released, Courtney Sinclair, whose family hosted Sunday morning hockey at the arena for 53 years, found out they would have to be ready to play at 6:30 in the morning. Another recreational league, the No-Stars, found their time had been moved from 11:30 in the morning to 10:10 pm Sunday.

Sinclair added some of the ice time given to Lambton Attack – the local girls hockey league – is also impractical since it was late Sunday evening and the clubs rules restrict nighttime play before a school day.

“The effect of the decision to take ice times from senior hockey players at reasonable hours and only grant the night time, ice time at extremely unreasonable times, early in the morning and late at night, is to effectively place barriers that prevent these athletes from enjoying the ice and participating in the sport at all,” she told council, adding she worries some of the rec leagues will fold.

“It is patently unreasonable to expect a single user to only have an ice time made available to them at 6:30 am on a Sunday morning or 10:10 pm on a Sunday night.”

Sinclair says the leagues have moved in the past, when the Alvinston Flyers moved to Petrolia, but the times then were more reasonable.

“The new schedule doesn’t provide longer stretches of ice time nor, according to a letter from the PMHA, does it provide more ice time for the minor league,” Sinclair said noting the real problem is the town may need two ice pads.

“The solution to that problem cannot be to deprive other users of a reasonable opportunity to use the ice pad in Petrolia.”

Council asked staff to take another look at the schedule.

Councillor Chad Hyatt also wants Petrolia to consider an ice time policy, like Sarnia, which might eliminate some of the disputes over ice times.