Hockey community pleased with increased capacity limits in Thunder Bay arenas

A plea from Thunder Bay's hockey community to allow more spectators in the stands at satellite arenas hit a nerve with most city councillors on Monday night.

Council passed a resolution, tabled by Coun. Albert Aiello, to increase the capacity of the arenas to 50 per cent of normal seating. The rule change brings the capacity in line with Ontario pandemic guidelines.

"I believe that there is room to increase the spectator capacity limits without exceeding the total facility capacity limits permitted by the legislation." Aiello wrote in a memo to council.

The new limits would see the following number of spectators:

• Port Arthur Arena, 308.
• Current River Arena, 155.
• Delaney Arena, 110.
• Grandview Arena, 102.
• Neebing Arena, 94.

Lex MacArthur, who made a deputation to council, said the increase in capacity is the right move.

MacArthur runs a hockey community Facebook page and is vice-president of the Westfort Hockey Association.

"I am hoping that our kids get rewarded and our parents get rewarded for our due diligence over the last 19 months," MacArthur said to CBC News.

"Our community has gone out and got vaccinated. We're ready to resume normal." 

New capacity measures may take time to kick in

MacArthur said previous limits imposed by city administration were too low, not allowing a supporter for each child playing hockey to be in the stands. The new limits will make that a reality, he said.

"What this would allow is any parent, any grandparent, aunt, uncle to attend the games of their child. It does not mean that every game, every practice, will be to this 50 per cent capacity, it will just allow for everybody who wants to get out and support our players to be able to do so."

While the support from council is a positive, MacArthur said he is worried that it will take too long to get the new capacity measures up and running.

"I'm a bit concerned with how the implementation will go. The hockey communities are willing to do their part, and we're waiting for word from administration on how we can help."

Kelly Robertson, general manager of Community Services with the city, said in a statement to CBC News there could be a delay in implementing the new capacities.

"It may take up to a month to adequately resource to support increased spectator capacity limits," Robertson said, noting the city will do an online survey to see where the capacity of 45 spectators was not satisfactory.

The city can then focus its resources to those times and arenas, Robertson said.

More screeners will be needed

Staffing will also remain a challenge, Robertson said, as more cleaner/screener positions will need to be filled, along with creating more access points where people can be screened for entry. 

She said in the statement it will also work with its contracted security provider to see if it can provide more support staff or create a volunteer program to have more screeners.

MacArthur said the development is positive, but also noted more than 600 spectators were allowed into Fort William Stadium to watch a high school football game.

He said the processing time for people to attend the football game, and for an arena are different and he doesn't understand why.

"She [Kelly Robertson] gave a time of 15 seconds required to process people for the COVID screening and to check the vaccination status, yet, the number doesn't seem to be the same for the Fort William Stadium," MacArthur said.

He said a Thunder Bay Kings hockey team played a game over the weekend in Manitoba, with parents telling him processing times were a few seconds per person for COVID-19 screening.

MacArthur said the hockey season for his organization starts after Thanksgiving, and he's hopeful the new capacity limits will be in place by then.