Dear Twin City Youth Hockey membership:
Thank you all for your cooperation this season in helping to ensure that the kids have been able to get on the ice and have some fun during this turbulent year.
We are reaching out today to update you on some exciting changes coming to our organization. Please take the time to read through the entire email, as we want to be sure everyone understands what is and is not changing.
For the 2021 -2022 season, we will be retiring the town program known as the Twin City Hawks. While it has served us well for the past decades, we feel it is time for a few changes to freshen up the program and continue to provide the very best opportunities for our players and families.
We are officially re-launching as a club team, the Junior Falcons Hockey Club.
We are NOT becoming an “elite” program – the club team will continue to operate exactly as it does today, just with a few different rules that will provide our program room to grow and provide more opportunities for our players.
We are sure you are now asking “But, why?” Well, for starters, being a town program we are under the jurisdiction of Mass Hockey rules, which can be restrictive in how we run our program. The biggest restriction from Mass Hockey is that currently we are only able to pull players from the Lunenburg, Leominster and Fitchburg area, with only a limited number of exceptions allowed. Becoming a club organization means we will no longer be subject to this geographic restriction, and will allow an unlimited number players from other communities to join us.
We will still compete in the Valley League as we have for years. However, we will now be eligible to have teams who may qualify to play at the highest levels of the Valley League, known as the E9 Division. Currently, as a town program we are only able to play up to the AAA Division. This allows further development and opportunities for our teams that may have the talent to qualify for these upper-level divisions.
Now for what is NOT changing:
- We will remain as a not-for-profit organization and we will remain as a volunteer run organization. All positions from coaches to Board members will still be filled by volunteers.
- We will keep true to our mission to provide affordable hockey to all. Tuition for the next season will not increase outside of our normal adjustments required to offset ice, league fees and insurance cost increases.
- We will continue to provide opportunities for all who want to play, and we will still never cut players. We believe all those that enjoy the sport should have a place in our organization.
- We will continue our partnership with Zach’s Goal, and will continue to offer all of the same programs (Learn to Skate, Hockey Development, house hockey, Girls/Boys High School etc.)
Registration and evaluations for the next season will be announced and starting soon.
We are excited for this fresh new look, and hope you are too! Rest assured that we still strive to provide your children affordable, safe, organized and quality programs regardless of level of play. At the heart of the program, under any name, that remains our number one priority.
There will still be many questions this email doesn’t answer, and it is extremely important to us that you bring these questions forward so we can address them to ease any concerns our parents might have. Please reach out directly to either Aimee Murphy, Secretary of the Board (secretary@tcyha.org), or Ken Howlett, President of the Board (president@tcyha.org) with any and all questions and concerns. If you are thinking it, someone else is too.
As the Junior Falcons continue towards launch, we will be sending further communications with additional details, please stay tuned.
