Volleyball league bumped

Peterborough Ladies Volleyball League unable to play at its long-time home at St. Peter Secondary School because Invado volleyball got first dibs

A long-standing women’s volleyball league fears they’re on the brink of extinction after losing out on a space they’ve played at for nearly 25 years.

The Peterborough Ladies Volleyball League didn’t land St. Peter Secondary School’s triple gymnasium for their season again this year.

The league of about 200 women, ages 16 to 68, has played at St. Pete’s on Thursday’s from September to April for 23 years.

Last year was the first time they lost the gym to another group and now this year, they didn’t get it again.

The rental policy of the Peterborough Victoria Northumberland and Clarington Catholic District School Board is that youth groups get first dibs on the gyms. After that, the space is open to the public on a firstcome, first-serve basis.

Interested groups need to register online to get the space and whoever signs up first, gets it.

This year, and last, Invado, a locally based volleyball company, got their bid in first.

But the ladies’ league said they experienced glitches when trying to get their application in and this year, they were just a minute behind Invado.

Alida Becker has played with the ladies league since 1980.

The league started in 1972, first playing out of Kenner Collegiate Vocational Institute. Three years later, the group moved to the YMCA, before finally settling at St. Peter in 1993.

Becker said St. Peter has been perfect fit for the league and they were extremely disappointed to lose the gym after all these years.

After the league lost St. Peter gym to Invado last year, the Catholic board offered up Holy Cross Secondary School’s gym at the same time and day. But there was some miscommunication and the league didn’t accept the offer in time.

That left the women shuffling from gym to gym to make the season work, spanning across five locations overall.

If that’s the case this year, Becker said the league is at risk of folding, because the ladies don’t want the hassle of moving around.

“Our league is in threat of extinction,” she said.

This year, the Catholic school board has offered the league Friday nights at St. Peter, but Becker said the women who play aren’t able to switch nights.

Becker reached out to Invado’s owners to see if they’d take the Friday and give the Thursday back to the ladies’ league.

But Becker said Invado’s owner relied saying they couldn’t make the switch, but would be happy to help with costs at another facility on a Sunday.

But again, that doesn’t work for the ladies.

Becker said she’d still like to see Invado trade days. She said they already have lots of other leagues in the city and in Oshawa and Pickering, too.

“You’re pushing out the little people here,” Becker said of Invado.

The ladies’ league is appealing the board’s decision at a board meeting on June 27.

Becker is hoping the board will reconsider renting to non-profit organizations before accepting applications from profitable companies.

Though the women will have a chance to have their say at the board meeting, Galen Eagle, board spokesman, said that as a publicly funded institution, the board has to be transparent in their process and can’t pick favourites.

“We understand this volleyball group would like the board to provide it with the same facility every year in the same time slot but our policy does not allow for this kind of special treatment,” said Eagle, adding the board has offered other alternatives that have been turned down.

But Becker said she’d still like to see some preferential treatment for her league’s 23 years at the gym.

“Loyalty has to count for something,” she said.