INNISFAIL - The community has rallied to prevent the town's minor football program from folding.
The membership of the Innisfail Minor Football Association (IMFA) defeated two motions at an emergency public meeting on March 28 at the Innisfail Aquatic Centre to suspend league teams due to lack of coaches, players and volunteers. The 2018 season, which officially starts in August, will go on with a new board and increased volunteers and coaches, and hopefully more players.
"We have so much support from the town, so much from the community at large with people stepping up to volunteer. I had people stopping me on the street asking me how they could help," said outgoing president Talitha Watkinson, who stepped down at the end of the meeting for new president Brian Thomas. "They want to see these teams continue, so I am happy the membership voted to continue."
Early last month, the board sent out an urgent plea to members and the community to let them know that unless more volunteers stepped up and the association received more registrations for the 2018 season, the program would be in danger of folding on March 28.
However, since that plea the association, created 11 years ago, received numerous calls from citizens willing to step up to volunteer, including for board positions and to coach at the atom, peewee and bantam levels.
"It's exciting. It's new board positions, new members. There is a lot of hope," said parent Alexis Verhegge whose nine-year-old son Luka Ellis played last year at the atom level. Verhegge, who attended the emergency meeting, was chosen to serve the association as a volunteer club manager.
During the emergency meeting the membership discussed several issues before a vote was taken on whether to suspend IMFA operations. There was a passionate discussion on whether the IMFA should reach out to other communities to invite young football players to play with the Innisfail teams, a scenario that could help with the IMFA's ongoing struggle to attract enough players.
"I think if we want to grow we have to reach out to other communities that may be struggling," said vice- president Kim Thompson. "We need to step out of our box."
The membership was told the Olds bantam team is being challenged to survive due to coaching issues and a demand from the Central Football League it must have a minimum of 30 players registered for the 2018 season.
"The peewee program in Olds is quite strong with good numbers," said George Grant, head coach for the Olds High School football team, who attended the March 28 meeting. "I don't know if they are going to meet that 30, but we are hoping to get as close as we can and assemble a coaching staff and hopefully in 2018 we can assemble a bantam program."
The board was also told there was a "disconnect" with communications, especially with parents. Some in attendance said all parties must make a commitment to work together to resolve the problematic issue.
Thomas, who also coaches at the atom level, promised after the meeting that improving communications with parents and the community will be a top priority.
"We got to get our new people to communicate a little bit better and see if we can get a few more community volunteers and just try to strengthen our board a little bit more," said Thomas. "We will definitely have to have a board meeting to come up with new strategies on how we can better communicate because there were a few parents concerned with communications issues. Definitely, it's going to have to be one of the priorities. If nobody communicates, nothing gets done, right?"
In the meantime, the new board will forge ahead to get more volunteers, coaches and players before the season starts. To date, nine coaches have signed on for the 2018 season. Board members said on March 28 they are looking for a total of 12.
Jana Brazil, the association's registrar, said 18 kids are required to field an atom team but 21 have already registered. She said 14 kids have registered for peewee, with 25 needed for the new season. The association also requires 25 players to register for bantam. So far 10 have signed on.
If any citizen wants to register their children in any of the association's three levels her or she can contact Verhegge at 780-668-8697, or email her at [email protected] or visit www.innisfailminorfootball.com
