Broncos president stepping down

Man who led team in days after bus crash won’t seek another term

After more than four months in the unrelenting glare of the international spotlight, Kevin Garinger says he does not plan to seek another term as president of the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team.

Garinger, who took on the job because he wanted to help the city’s beloved hockey club, emerged as its public face after the horrific bus crash in early April. Local, national and international reporters printed and broadcast his words around the world, and he is understood to be under intense pressure from within the community of 5,000 people as well.

In an interview on Tuesday, the 50-year-old from Creighton said he had decided hours earlier to not stand for re-election when the team’s newly reconstituted board of directors met Tuesday night.

“I want to make sure that I’m doing the best job I possibly can in all those other areas of life,” said Garinger, who is the director of education for the Horizon School Division and has a large family with eight grandchildren.

“We’ve got a full board. And that board has a number of people who have stepped up and I’m grateful for that. I’m glad that someone else is going to take on the responsibilities that relate to this.”

Sixteen people were killed and another 13 were injured when the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League team’s bus, bound for a playoff game in Nipawin, collided with a tractor-trailer north of Tisdale on April 6.

Garinger, who is also working on a doctorate in educational leadership, was on his way home from Edmonton when the bus and the semi collided.

That night, and over the days that followed, the team’s volunteer president spoke eloquently about the scope of the tragedy, and how a sense of unspeakable grief rippled through the city east of Saskatoon.

Earlier this month, the Humboldt Broncos elected seven new members to its 12-person board of directors. The new directors include Jamie Brockman, who served as president of the team until August 2017.

Garinger is not the only Broncos executive stepping down. Treasurer Darrin Duell, who also leads the corporation controlling almost $15 million raised online after the crash, was also expected not to seek re-election at the board meeting. In a statement, Duell — who will remain president of the Humboldt Broncos Memorial Fund Inc. and the Humboldt Strong Community Foundation — said, “I plan to continue as a director at large until the completion of my term next year.”

When they convened in Humboldt around 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, one of their first tasks would be to elect executive members for the coming year.

Garinger said he’ll help as much as he can, but he won’t be the president.

“Today,” he said, “I feel a calmness that I haven’t felt in a long time.”