State House OKs safety study in athletics, hockey neck guards

HARTFORD — The state House of Representatives on Tuesday unanimously voted to create a task force to study the issue of safety in youth athletics, with particular focus on the use of neck guards in ice hockey, following the death this year of a New Canaan teenager.

The 145-0 vote, after a brief debate, sends the bill, the impetus for which was the January death of 16-year-old Teddy Balkind, to the Senate. The St. Luke's School sophomore died after a collision in Greenwich with a Brunswick School player whose skate cut his neck.

The bill would require the group of educators, coaches, sports psychologists, recreation officials and trainers to issue a report by Jan. 1 of next year, at which time youth sports, schools and leagues may adopt the findings and recommendations.

While the initial legislative response was to require neck guards for hockey players similar to the rule of the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, physicians told lawmakers that for some players, the neck equipment might lead to spinal problems.

Leading the house debate, state Rep. Mary Welander, DOrange, vice chairwoman of the legislative Children's Committee, said that the hockey fatality underscored the need to look into the general safety protocols and injury prevention regulations in youth, intramural and interscholastic programs, plus the issues around hockey neck guards.

State Rep. Stephen Meskers, D-Greenwich, said that after the death, many people in his town reached out to him for a response to the accident, while Rep. Nicole Klarides-Ditria, R-Seymour, sought to look into possibly expanding the rule on mandatory neck guards for hockey players in all leagues. St. Luke's and the Brunswick School play in the Fairchester Athletic Association of private schools.

“I don't think anyone wants to see this type of a tragedy befall any parent, any child, both in this case or any other athletic endeavors,” Meskers said.

Meskers said the next step is getting together the athletic officials at private schools and public schools to come up with uniform policies for health and safety. “I think the research and the task force they are working to establish will help to prevent further tragedies and to provide a bench mark of comparative safety protocols among the various leagues within the state of Connecticut,” he said.

Klarides-Ditria said that when the news of Balkind's death quickly reached the state's athletic community, it highlighted the need for research into the issue, which quickly expanded from ice hockey to all sports. “Our goal as legislators is to protect the residents of Connecticut and our student athletes, our mostprecious commodity here in Connecticut,” Klarides-Ditria said.

Rep. Tom O'Dea, R-New Canaan, recalled that during a recent public hearing, he noted that the most-common cause of death in teenage boys is cardiac arrest. “A simple EKG can save a lot of lives in Connecticut alone, for young, particularly young athletes,” O'Dea said, recalling the September, 2020 death of 16-year-old George DiRocco, a Wilton High School football player.

“An EKG would have saved his life,” O'Dea said. Welander said that the cardiac issue could become part of the scope of the task force. “Looking at the people that are going to be on this task force, I will make it a priority to reach out to them and ask them to include that inquiry in the task force because it is such an important issue,” O'Dea said.