New PHA president tackling hockey affordability issue

The cost of hockey is one of the biggest concerns of the Peter borough Hockey Association’ s new president.

James Bradburn was acclaimed as president during the PHA’s AGM on May 9, replacing John Welsh. Welsh stepped down after 25 years as president of the PHA and it’s predecessor the Peterborough Minor Hockey Association. The PHA has almost 1,200 players with 800 in house league and 390 in AE, A and AA rep levels.

Bradburn sees the cost of hockey and a shortage of ice as the biggest issues facing the PHA. The PHA is trying to be proactive in making hockey affordable.

“Over the next year or two we’re trying to implement a program to figure out what it actually costs a player in say tyke or atom or bantam to play incorporating everything from the ice to game fees, referee fees, timekeepers, registration costs so, in future, when we set our registration prices we’ll know exactly what that player is getting for that $500 or $600,” he said.

“One thing we are promoting is the financial assistance programs we have through our website. If you go on there now you can see a list of them. We also have a program called PHA Cares which is a fund families who can’t afford hockey can access to play hockey. That’s something we’re really trying to grow.”

Two seasons ago, the PHA had an excess of more than $60,000 of unused ice despite a perceived shortage of ice. Bradburn said they cleaned that up this year trimming it to $11,000.

“What we’ve implemented is cleaning that up and I can assure members there are not going to be anymore of those monster unused ice issues in the future.”

In fact, there are teams that have trouble finding practice ice in Peterborough.

“We’ve found in the past we’re using rinks in the county,” he said. “Ice is always going to be an issue.”

Bradburn, 46, is a Peterborough native, who played for St. Andrew’s in the Peterborough Community Church Hockey League (PCCHL) as a youth and for Bob Armstrong at Lakefield College School. He is a graduate of Guelph University and Humber College in business and marketing courses and is now a salesman for IKO Building Materials.

Bradburn started volunteering as an assistant coach in the PMHA in 2006 and his three boys Noah, 11, Aidan, 14, and Eric, 17, have all played in the PMHA/PHA. Bradburn will coach the peewee AE Petes next season.

He was approached by Scott Seabrook to join the PMHA executive in 2007 and has served as house league director, rep director and last season was VP of rep hockey.

When no one put in their name to replace Welsh, Bradburn decided to step up.

“We’ve got some really great people involved now,” Bradburn said. “This association has grown and there are some really quality people involved who are going to make the workload easier for a lot of people. In the past, John and a few people did all the work, and that was a problem, in my opinion. There was no delegating and trying to spread the resources around. That’s our plan going forward.”

He knows Welsh leaves big shoes to fill.

“John put so much time and effort into it I don’t think I’ll ever be able to replace him and his knowledge. Mind you, he’ll be around and says he’s only a phone call away,” he said.

Bradburn believes the vice-president of rep role prepared him for the trouble-shooting which inevitably comes with the role.

“The VP of rep role is probably one of the more challenging strictly from a conflict-resolution standpoint,” he said. “You’re dealing with situations from coaching issues, referee issues, game issues, other centres. Quite frankly, the rep side is a very intense side of hockey.”

Bradburn was involved in the amalgamation of the PMHA and PCCHL into the PHA in 2012. While it wasn’t easy to work through the issues related to bringing two organizations together, Bradburn believes it’s turned out well for local hockey.

“The efficiencies are much better. The programs we can offer kids from house league and rep have improved. The success this year we had with our rep teams was the best we’ve ever had with two OMHA champions and two finalists.”

On the house league side they’re introducing a tournament in November and December called the President’s Cup.

“We’re really trying to offer everyone a fun place to play,” he said. “The house league is our seed and we’re trying to make it better for our recreational players. We’re going to provide every player socks and a jersey so everyone matches and looks appropriate on the ice where in the past there has been a lot of mis-matched stuff.”

Bradburn said he got involved to give back.

“I just love seeing a kid leaving the rink with a smile knowing that he’s learning a skill, having fun and meeting new friends,” he said. “As a parent and a coach it’s really rewarding to see that.

“All I want is everyone who joins the PHA to have a lovely memory of it when they walk away from the game.”