Dear MAML Hockey Family and the Parents of our Skaters,
As you have been well informed over the past several months, our Youth Hockey program and particularly our Lawful Gambling program, which generates a significant amount of funds that are used to off-set our/your skater’s hockey bills, has gone through several very positive changes this past year. However, we need a minimal commitment from you, the parents of our skaters. Our gambling program needs volunteer support for both Bingo and Meat Raffle at Hawk's Bar & Grill. With 20 volunteers, you will only need to work about once every 5 weeks!!!!! Less if even more of you give us a commitment. Is that too much to ask to continue to receive the benefit of probably more than $50,000 in income from our gambling program next season? The decision to help is yours, and the time is NOW! I know that hockey season is over, but Bingo and Meat Raffle go on all year, as does our Gambling Program, generating funds today, to pay for ice next season.
By the way, those that join our Bingo/Meat Raffle team will earn all of their volunteer hours for both concessions and general volunteer time, for those that work more hours than they are required for their volunteer hours, it will be credited against your next years ice bills!!!
Please call Shelly Jones to sign up: 612-719-0125.
As the Gambling Manager for our organization, I want to share with each of you what our gambling program means to our association, and you as a member of our hockey family. First, you all need to know what it costs our association to purchase ice at the Moose or any other hockey arena. This past season, we paid a fixed rate of $150/hour for ice time (the going rate around the area was $160/hour). Based on the number of teams and skaters we had last season, we needed approximately 800 hours of ice time. Next season, the hourly ice rate at the "Moose" will be $165/hour. This was voted on just last week, because the going rate and costs to operate the facility are going up.
Last seasons calculations: 800 hours X $150/hour = $120,000 for our kids to skate. Based on approximately 250 skaters in our program, the average cost for "just ice time" is around $480 per skater. This is the burden that each of us as hockey parents "on average" need to pay, just for ice. This does not include equipment costs, arena mortgage expenses, Tournament fees, or other expenses it takes to run our association, and put our kids on the ice. With all of these other expenses, it is estimated that it cost "on average" $800 per skater/year last season.
Based on this, and depending on the age/level your skater is, you may pay more or less. This is determined based on actual ice hours each team/level gets each year. IP being less, and Bantam being more.
Well, now that you better understand how our expense side works, let's look at the credit side.
This past season, our Gambling Program paid for nearly $55,000 of this $120,000 ice bill. This added income to pay for ice, has allowed our association to work very hard at satisfying our mortgage and other debt obligations for our arena, while continuing to keep our ice bills for each skater in line or even less than many of our surrounding communities. Your benefit as a parent from this $55,000 influx of cash flow from our Gambling Program is approximately $220 per skater/year "on average".
You may be asking, why are you telling me this? First, I want to share with you and everyone in our association how expensive it is to put our kids on the ice, and also for you to understand how important our Gambling Program is to our association, and you personally in regard to lowering our ice bills. Next year, with our increase in ice costs per hour, that will increase our expenses by $8000 - $12,000 for the season. However, it is my hope and expectation that our Gambling Program can offset much, if not all of this increase in ice expense.
However, we cannot do this without your help! As mentioned above, Shelly Jones, our Bingo & Meat Raffle coordinator and I have been begging for your support and volunteer help for months, but our hockey family has all but let us down. We have had a few members step forward to help, but it is not fair for "a few" to have to do all of the work. We have been asking for several volunteers (12 - 20) to commit to our Bingo/Meat Raffle Team up at Hawk's. Without these volunteers, we can no longer support our obligation to the bar owner at Hawk's who gave us the huge opportunity to be their "exclusive" gambling partner. However, this "exclusive" partnership is tied to our ability to continue to provide the Friday evening Meat Raffle, as we had been doing, and to also take responsibility for the Wednesday evening Bingo program, that the Lions Club used to run, while they also sold pull-tabs in the bar.
With the Lions Club gone since December, we have done very well in our Gambling Program, in generating revenue and income that has been used to pay for ice bills for our association. But, if we do not get the support we need (12 - 20 volunteers), we may be forced to hire workers for Bingo/Meat Raffle, which will have a major impact on the profitability of the program and my ability to meet those needs due to the rising costs we will face next year. I will no longer be able to provide the $55,000 plus dollars next year, to our youth hockey program. Without this income from Lawful Gambling, you as a parent will see an increase in your ice bills of more than $220 per skater "on average" next year. Bantam’s will pay more than $220, while IP may pay a little less. This is a great program, and a huge opportunity for all in our association, but I am not sure most of you fully understand what is at stake, and what it really costs to put your skater on the ice.
I hope each of you reading this letter now, better understand all of this, and I hope you care! Many of you younger skater’s parents are getting the benefit of not having to drive to St. Cloud 3 nights per week for practice and games. This is because many of us older parents have worked hard to get this arena constructed and have worked hard to develop our hockey program so that more of you can benefit from the work that has already been done. But the work is "never" over. We need volunteers at all levels of our organization, to keep this program going, and to continue to generate additional income from fundraisers, gambling, etc. We thank all of you for your work in the concession stand (generating another $35,000 this season), our board members, committee members, coaches, team reps, concession coordinators, and other volunteers who continue to help us "get it done"!
Thank you for your understanding and help!
Sincerely,
Trent Gifford John Stejskal
Gambling Manager President
