Cavs hockey coach knows all about budget cuts

Friday, January 22, 2010

Hollis/Brookline High School head ice hockey coach Tim Clark got the word sometime toward the tail end of the last school year.

“There was talk that (the H/B school district) would be helping us out, but they told me there was nothing in the budget,” Clark said. “I said, ‘I understand that, we’ll do what we need to do until you can help us out.’

“But this was supposed to be the year.”

Instead, Clark and his crew went back to fundraising – raffles, outstretched cans at retail entrances, corporate sponsorship calls, etc. – to scrape together the $20,000 plus it takes to run the Cavaliers’ program that competes in Division III.

“It’s the same people doing it every year,” he said.

It’s hockey. It’s what hockey people do. But the hockey community in Nashua has never had to do what it’s going to be forced to undertake in the next few weeks – a battle for the survival of two programs in the wake of proposed school budget cuts.

It’s not going to be easy. Usually, something like this happens and you think it’s so-called scare tactics, an eye-opening way to get the dollars eventually funded to run quality high school academic and athletic programs. Could be.

But this is a different world we live in, where no expenditure can be taken for granted, public or private. The sooner the local hockey community realizes this, the better.

The communication has already begun with a bevy of e-mails making the rounds. If it’s one thing that hockey parents understand, it’s dollars and cents, because they’ve already spent a lot of it on their sons and daughters.

Here’s one outsider’s take:

“I’ll tell you what’s happening,” he said. “It’s because they’ve been losing. They’re not contenders any more.”

Well, that would be hard to believe as well. Word has it hockey has always been discussed during the budget process, simply because of its large price tag. And remember, now the Nashua district is paying for ice time for not one, but two teams. And that’s where the bulk of any program’s expense is. Ponds are free, but not indoor rinks. Budget cuts aren’t based on wins and losses.

It was always thought that the competitive suffering the North and South programs have endured would be the biggest obstacle they would face – as numbers continue to dwindle or at least level off – not the axe of an official or a political board. Winning, though, always helps everything.

It happened in Manchester this past year with the demise of West’s varsity program after the Bedford departure. Numbers reportedly didn’t justify competing at the varsity level, but there is said to be a junior varsity program in place as the Blue Knights start over.

There’d be no starting over in Nashua. That was what has been taking place this season with new coaches at both schools, Darryl Green at North and Dan Beliveau at South.

As Beliveau said earlier this year when asked about his team’s early struggles, “We’re trying to build a program here.”

That’s in the long term. In the short term, the budget process is a detailed, unpredictable winding road. Money goes here, it goes there, it comes from here, it comes from there, it’s re-allocated here, re-worked there. Following it is going to be an arduous task.

Meanwhile, the Panthers and Titans play on. With a renewed sense of purpose? Perhaps, but they’ve been determined to stop the bleeding in the loss column all season.

“We have more determination, so that when people come to Conway Arena, we can teach them that we can actually play hockey,” North forward Melissa Robbins said. “But I’m not really sure how this will affect us.”

We’d say here that the odds against hockey being eliminated are slim. But the threat is real, and it may remain that way every year.

Clark was asked what it would be like if there was no high school hockey in Nashua next year.

“Oh my God,” he said. “It would be shameful.”

But come budget time, the dollar game knows no shame.

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com or 594-6468.