Officials with the Innisfail Minor Lacrosse Association say they have been left scratching their heads trying to figure out why Canada's official national summer sport has been shoved to the sidelines by the public school board.
Attendance at the association's winter training camp has been cut in half this year due to extra travel. Two dozen Innisfail youth must now travel to Olds College in order to attend weekly practices after Chinook's Edge School division, citing potential damage concerns, refused several requests to use its local facilities.
ìIt's kind of funny that Innisfail has to come to Olds to practise,î said Heather Stauffer, equipment coordinator for the association. ìChinook's Edge School Division will not allow lacrosse bookings for conditioning in their gyms, yet they allow floor hockey and basketball.î
Stauffer said she has a hard time seeing how lacrosse could cause any damages, particularly after the club went out and bought mats to put underneath their nets, on top of the rope they wind around the base so there is no direct contact with even the mat.
ìI don't know why they think we're hurting their facility,î she said. ìNow we have to haul the nets back and forth.î
In an email sent Oct. 25, 2012, Ecole Innisfail Middle School Principal Jay Steeves said the school board received ìa huge email responseî after checking into lacrosse bookings across the school division.
ìMany responses stated that they have never had lacrosse booked into their facilities and those who have were seeing damage to the floor and walls and have stopped accepting bookings,î he said in the email, adding the town's Joint Use Committee would prefer the lacrosse association stick to the concrete arena floor.
No further details on the nature of previous damages were included in the message.
A lengthy response sent by the organization Nov. 13 noted the organization noted the lacrosse stick head is made up of composite plastic materials comparable to a floor hockey stick and the lacrosse sticks currently in the school board's inventory. A detailed comparison between a regulation NCAA lacrosse ball and a regulation NCAA basketball was also included.
ìAs you can see the ball outweighs, and out bounces a lacrosse ball, and is also a considerably larger projectile,î it read.
The message also mentioned Deer Meadow School, Olds High School and Olds College were all used as interim training facilities in March and April 2012, as the Olds Lacrosse Association waited for ice to come out of the arena.
The letter inspired a change of heart from Steeves, who vowed to advocate on behalf of the lacrosse association.
ìI am willing to shift my own personal opinion as I would argue the exact same position from a baseball standpoint,î he wrote back the very same day. ìI will re-approach this topic with the CESD facilities department and see where I can get. If we can convince them then it should not be difficult convincing the JUC committee.î
In a followup letter sent Nov. 20 to Allan Tarnoczi, Chinook's Edge associate superintendent, the Innisfail Minor Lacrosse Association upped the ante, pledging to provide a damage deposit or have any potential damages assessed and paid for by the association upon program completion. The group also suggested using soft pink balls instead of the rubber regulation balls.
A synopsis of the school board's final rejection was sent from Tarnoczi to the group by email Dec. 21.
ìLacrossse is not allowed in the CESD schools because there is a probability that playing it in the gym will damage facilities,î he wrote. ìCESD believes this probability of damage to be high enough to prohibit the activity.î
Calgary Roughnecks Captain Andrew McBride, who runs the winter training, is surprised the Innisfail players can't use the Chinook's Edge gyms, especially since he was invited to be part of an official school demonstration earlier in the year.
ìThey won't let us in the school, but this year I went in and did the school program which is identical,î he said. ìI don't know how well thought out the process is. You want to be informed in your decision.î
McBride says after working in 150 schools and training over 70,000 kids he has never once received a complaint about facility damages as a result of their activities.
ìAny time you can't get a facility it will obviously set back the development of the sport,î he said. ìIt's a huge part of our heritage.î
In an interview with the Province Tarnoczi said research by the school board into the danger of lacrosse to facilities included contacting other facilities and school districts, but wouldn't elaborate when repeatedly asked for specifics.
ìWe're very cautious to make sure when we rent out the facilities they're not going to experience any damage,î he said.
"Chinook's Edge School Division will not allow lacrosse bookings for conditioning in their gyms, yet they allow floor hockey and basketball."Heather Stauffer, Innisfail Minor Lacrosse Association
