Parking lot at ice arena to reopen
Parents had petitioned Piney Orchard to reverse ban implemented Sunday
Piney Orchard Ice Arena management Wednesday reversed course on a rule implemented Sunday that barred parents from staying in the parking lot after dropping off their kids, the arena’s ownerMurry Gunty said.
The arena will now permit parents to stay in the parking lot on weekdays. According to an email some parents received Tuesday night, a plan for weekends will be developed and masks are required at all times while parents are not sitting within their vehicles.
“We decided to try again and open the parking lot effective today,” Gunty wrote in a text. “We are also going to experiment with allowing some parents in the building to reduce congestion and gatherings in the parking lot. Will see if that makes the situation better for everyone.”
Parents of Anne Arundel hockey players had petitioned Piney Orchard to allow them to stay in the parking lot, citing player safety concerns.
Severna Park resident Ashley ByrneRice, whose son Jamison Rice, 7, is a goalie in the Junior Black Bears program, created the petition calling for the arena to reverse its new policy. As of Wednesday afternoon, the petition had more than1,500 signatures since Sunday.
Byrne-Rice was surprised by the strong response fromfellowparents.
By not being permitted to stay in the parking lot, Byrne-Rice noted there weren’t many options to remain close by while her child skates, which she finds concerning should something happen to her son. She recalled the recent tragic death of 13-year-old Henry Lent, a Carroll County resident who suffered a fatal brain injury during a hockey clinic in southernMaryland last month.
If something happened to her son, Byrne-Rice said, “They’d have to run out, call us, try to get us down there, make sure we’re local so we can get down there. It’s definitely a player safety issue.”
Gunty said the initial decision to ban staying in the parking lotwasmade after the Anne Arundel Department ofHealth received multiple complaints regarding parents congregating in the parking lot while their kidswere inside.
According to Gunty, officials from the health department frequented Piney Orchard’s facilities as often as five days a week. Health department spokesperson Elin Jones in a text message said the department did not go out daily but they
received complaints “concerning crowding in the parking lot [not social distancing and notwearing masks].”
“Imagine if you had to get five physicals a week. You’d be pretty gun shy about going to the doctor,” Gunty said of health department inspections. “We wouldn’t have any [spectators] in the building, kids get dressed in the parking lot, you have to wear a mask. … and we were still getting complaints.”
OnWednesday, Jones said the decision to reopen the lot was up to management, but that mask-wearing and physical distancing must be in compliance with county health guidelines.
Emily St. Louis, whose son Brayden has played hockey for four years and competes at Piney Orchard, said she’s still nervous over what rules might be made for the weekends. AWednesday meeting between Junior Black Bears parents and players and rink management has been canceled, according to Tuesday night’s email.
“There has been no official notice from the rink/owner so we feel like once all of this dies down it will be pulled right back from underneath us,” St. Louis wrote in a text message. “The meeting being canceled was confusing and there is no trust there at all.”
Byrne-Rice shared similar concerns. “There were more questions we wanted answered than just the parking lot. Iwould also want the owner to send us a official statement from rink management about the parking lot,” she wrote in a text. “Murry also should be recognizing that he needs to do better [for] the parents that spend thousands of dollars at his ice rink and take ownership that what he did was wrong and not safe for these kids.”
St. Louis said she witnessed small groups of parents talking next to their cars and other parents sitting under tents, half of them wearing masks, but nothing she thought violated social-distancing regulations. She said she would never leave the car except to meet her son at the door for pickup.
Gunty said parents’ gatherings amounted to more than just a small handful here and there.
“Honestly, it looked like a Ravens tailgate in our parking lot. People were coming up with RVs,” Gunty said. “We couldn’t get them to stop. Sure enough, the health department gave us a hard time about that. I’m just trying not to get shut down. We had to close the parking lot.”
Though some parents who spoke with The Capital said they hadn’t seen any security guards attempt to break gatherings up, Gunty said thisweekend he sent a security guardtoask parents to disperse, to which he was met with anger and profanity fromparents.
Before he brought in security, Gunty said he’d personally have to break up crowds himself “all day long.”
“The alternative is that I’m going to have to call the police and have people arrested. We had a security guard and they were literally telling him to go ‘F off,’ ” Gunty said. “They will not disperse, they will not socially distance, they will not wear masks. If youwere in our parking lot this weekend, you would be uncomfortable from a health perspective. We [were] trying to obey rules.”