THUNDER BAY – Hockey fans in the region will be seeing some refs sporting green armbands this season as they take to the ice.
See the Green Stop the Mean is a new initiative by Hockey Northwestern Ontario (HNO) that will see all on-ice officials under the age of 18 wear a single green band on their left arms to identify them as minors to team staff, players, spectators, and parents.
Bryan Graham, director of officiating, HNO, says that the objective of this program is to reduce harassment and abuse of younger on-ice officials and to protect their psychological and physical safety at the arena.
Graham says that on-ice officials can start as early as 12 years old and that HNO has a lot of referees under the age of 18 in their program.
The big thing is that with hockey culture, the way it's changing, we certainly would never want adults, whether they’re parents or coaches, verbally abusing the players for errors they might make on the ice or misjudgment of certain things that happen within the game,” he said.
“So, certainly we can't allow those same parents and coaches to verbally abuse the young officials that are refereeing the hockey game.”
Graham says that across the country in hockey as well as most sports, recruitment and retention of officials continues to be a challenge and he says that when most first year officials drop out of programs, the main reason tends to be verbal abuse.
So, you know, we do have some officials that stick with it for two or three years, and usually if they bow out of the program at that point, it's for the same reason, so we do have some officials that work their way through it and continue on, but we're losing way too many of them for that reason,” he said.
“So, we're at a point where it's not a crisis, but you know when you look at the crystal ball, down the road, you know if there are no officials to referee the games, then there will be no games.
Graham says that HNO is striving to offer a positive environment to encourage young on-ice officials to continue in their program and that HNO has been taking steps to enforce the code of conduct to reduce abuse faced by referees, but they hope to see real change through this program.
“There are situations when games have been stopped and the parents are asked to leave the arena or the game will not continue there, it's very isolated when that happens,” he said.
“But I think this program, when the people in the building, whether they’re parents or spectators in general, and the coaches and the players themselves when they notice that a young official is out there, identified with the green armband on, that they’ll think twice about doing it and that's going to be the real benefit of this program."
