Sportplex, borough square off over ice time, fees

BY MARC LALONDE

marc.lalonde@transcontinental.ca

Pierrefonds/Roxboro administrators and management of the privately-owned Sportplex 4 Glaces in Pierrefonds, where the borough’s hockey, ringette and figure-skating clubs spend the vast majority of their ice time, are still negotiating a new deal.

The original 10-year operation agreement ended earlier this summer.

A contingent of sports representatives — including Pierrefonds ringette association president Manon Cote-Fournier — showed up at borough hall recently to hear the two sides have at it.

Borough mayor Monique Worth said the Sportplex is raking the borough’s administration and, by extension, Pierrefonds / Roxboro children who depend on the Sportplex for ice time, over the coals.

“Last year, we paid $235 plus tax for an hour of ice time, and we felt that was reasonable. They want us to pay $375 plus tax an hour for ice time for the upcoming season. That’s much too high,” she said.

Worth said the new proposed contract also shortchanges associations in terms of actual hours used.

“We used to rent 4,360 hours of ice every year,” as the arena’s primary client, Worth said.

“Now, they’re saying we can only rent 3,924 hours a year, which will put some of the associations’ special events, such as tournaments and ice shows, at risk,” she said.

Sportplex 4 Glaces manager Pierre Brodeur was on vacation last week and could not be reached for comment, but said in The Chronicle’s sister paper, Cités Nouvelles, that it was the borough that requested the cut in the number of hours allotted.

“The borough will no longer save money on the Sportplex’s back,” Brodeur said, adding that the 3,924 hours are only assigned to two of the arena’s four ice surfaces.

“We render a number of services to the borough that go over and above simply renting sheets of ice. There’s a price for those services,” he said in the July 29 edition of Cités Nouvelle.

Worth said the situation has come to a head and she expects a compromise between the parties in order to possibly restore those ice-hours to associations.

“We’re not very happy about where things stand, but we are the principal tenant in the arena. It’s not like they’re going to be able to replace the purchase of those hours. We’ve helped them in the past, and we hope we’ll be able to come to some kind of agreement,” she said.