Can we just call out Laura Cahn for for she runs Vacaville rink and sits on the CAHA board.
So when a weekend needed to be dropped she chose a So Cal weekend getting dumped so her rink wouldn't lose that money.
Conflict of interest much?
Some of the club presidents have already questioned the CAHA Board and the rather odd way they carry out their responsibilities. Essentially, the response from the CAHA schedulers was the typical, "You signed up for it. It's too late to change. Are there any other questions I can answer?" (Actually, when we signed up there was no goofy flight system).
Anyway, I have come to the belief that the only way to go about this is to take our concerns directly to USA Hockey. I am currently putting together a very well-reasoned and thorough letter that outlines some of the concerns so many of us have. It will take a week or so to finalize as I want to make sure my facts are accurate. I want the person at USA Hockey to understand how many people here have valid concerns with some of the members of the CAHA Board. My goal is to leave emotion out of it and simply back up my arguments with facts. The main points of my letter will be:
- Announcing the Flight system after LOIs were signed and the placement of teams. It's pretty easy to show that a team that won no games in San Jose, and was placed in the first flight, had strong CAHA Board representation. Likewise, the same club has a team that was allowed to stay in AA when they have no business being there.
- The Wildcats/Jr. Reign should have been dropped. There is no reason they should have been allowed to remain a "AA" team. They also have CAHA Board representation. Favors are given to those "in the clique."
- The Wildcats/Jr. Reign's designation as a "Model ADM Club" should be called into question. If you do some research and actually read the PowerPoint presentations their president delivered to USA Hockey you'd think you were living in an alternate reality. USA Hockey apparently has accepted everything they have been told by the person from Riverside. A strong counter-argument needs to be presented to them. To support my position I have all their stats and related info from the past few years and can show how the club's actions appear to contradict the goals of the ADM in a rather large way. Once you begin creating graphs and putting information into picture form you begin to see things more clearly.
The concern I am trying to express is that special favors are given to certain people. The Board seems to have forgotten whom they represent and have taken on somewhat of a "siege mentality" where they believe it's "us against them." Of course, the California hockey families are "them."
Obviously, the situation where approximately 200 families from Southern California have to take their kids to Vacaville to play each other needs to be addressed. The connection is now quite clear. The marketing material coming from the NHL and USA Hockey tells us
Hockey is for Everyone. CAHA's decision-making process contradicts this. My family works very hard and earns an income that allows us to spend tons of money on a youth sport. Not every family can. Yes, I can buy a couple tickets on Southwest to Sacramento, pick up a rental car for the weekend, get a $150/night hotel for three nights and eat every meal in a restaurant for three days and still not miss a meal. Do you think this inhibits hockey's growth in our state?
The knee-jerk reaction I hear from so many is that "those people" should not play hockey. If we want to grow our sport, and if we want the very best athletes to become hockey players, we really need to find ways to make it more accessible. CAHA can't see this.
We understand our kids play in a state-wide league. We were all prepared to do the travelling and weren't complaining about it. When the hockey landscape was changed this season and we learned only SoCal teams were in the 2nd flight, CAHA was given an opportunity to do something good that could have calmed some of the more upset families and moved the Vacaville weekend to SoCal. They chose to dig in their heels and put their own wants/needs over those of the people that pay the bills.
Somebody in a position of responsibility above the state level should at least be brought into the loop as to what is happening here.
On another note, how does one go about getting a spot on the CAHA Board? I plan on looking into this a bit more but it seems that we need some of us in the decision-making positions. I would be very happy to do whatever I can to try and improve CA hockey for our kids and their families. I'd be happy to buy my own plane tickets to their meetings each month (or whenever they meet).
