NHL: Employees face pay cuts; players’ quarantine extended
The NHL, which has suspended its regular season because of the coronavirus outbreak, is asking league employees to take a pay cut.
The reductions will be around 25 per cent and affect employees making more than about $75,000 (U.S.), according to a person familiar with the matter. NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly confirmed that the league was making the cuts, but declined to comment further. The move would apply to league personnel, such as NHL executives, not team staffs and players.
The league is also extending its recommendation for players and staff to self-isolate and stay away from team facilities, Daly confirmed. Players and staff have been asked to extend their self-quarantine 10 days beyond the original March 27 timeline to April 6.
The NHL paused its regular season on March 12 with 189 games still remaining on teams’ schedules.
Canadiens’ cuts coming: The Montreal Canadiens are reducing their workforce. Groupe CH, which also owns the American Hockey League’s Laval Rocket, says it will proceed with a temporary reduction in personnel, impacting 60 per cent of the organization’s employees.
The reduction will start Monday.
Grope CH says it has established a $6-millon assistance fund to help employees. The organization says the fund will help enhance employment insurance benefits for eight weeks, ensuring that employees will receive 80 per cent of their base salary for that period. The fund will also provide loans to employees in difficult financial situations.
“Now more than ever, it is important to support our community and demonstrate our solidarity to one another. We are working extremely hard to limit the impact this situation will have on our employees,” Groupe CH owner Geoff Molson said in a statement.
Devils, Sixers owner reverses
course: Apollo Global Management co-founder Josh Harris, a co-owner of the Philadelphia 76ers and the New Jersey Devils, has retreated from a plan to cut the pay of team employees, saying “that was the wrong decision.”
Harris had ordered salaried employees’ pay to be cut by 20 per cent until June in response to the coronavirus crisis and the nationwide sports shutdown. Harris, who has a net worth of $4.3 billion, was widely panned on social media.
“After listening to our staff and players, it’s clear that was the wrong decision,” he said Tuesday in a statement. “This is an extraordinary time in our world — unlike any most of us have ever lived through before — and ordinary business decisions are not enough to meet the moment. To our staff and fans, I apologize for getting this wrong.”
Previously, the Devils had said the club would pay hourly workers and event staff at the team’s arena through the end of the regular season. Harris also owns the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J.