Hi Blackhawk Families! Your PEMAA board has been busy this summer, working through the rebranding process and planning our 2022-2023 hockey season. Along with those major undertakings, we have also been working on a cost analysis/comparison of surrounding Centres. We will share that information once it’s completed. Thus far, we have been able to determine, we remain one of the most affordable programs around. We have also established our fundraising - Bingos, Meat Raffles and Pizza Kit sales are instrumental in keeping your registration fees affordable while ensuring we are able to continue to offer the “extras” like paid tournament/jamboree fees, Spirit Day, Year end Banquet etc.
Many centres require a mandatory “volunteer” cheque which is destroyed once parents volunteer a certain number of hours. Cheques are cashed if the volunteer hours are not completed. We have always avoided having to do so but have recently found ourselves re-considering as our Meat Raffles become more and more challenging to manage with a lack of participation from our membership. In an effort to avoid mandatory volunteer cheques, we have come up with a plan we think is more than fair and should be easy for all to manage.
Each age group will be required to commit to 1-2 Meat Raffles over the course of the summer and Fall/Winter months. Parents are no longer required to work the “gate” , taking admission fees as gates have been eliminated across OMHA Centres. Also, you will be glad to know, at this time, we are not needing folks to work bingos!
In order to encourage and motivate folks to participate, we have decided tournament/jamboree fees will be directly linked with meat raffle participation. If your team completes their 1-2 meat raffles , tournament fees (up to $2000.00) for 2 tournaments will be released. If your team does not fulfill their obligation, PEMAA will only be funding one tournament entry fee (not to exceed $1000.00) and parents will need to chip in to fund any subsequent tournament fees.
To run a raffle, we need approximately 5 volunteers. The raffles are always on Fridays at Two Amigos. The commitment is 4:45-7:30 pm (max) we are often finished by 7:00pm. It is super fun and ideally, the rest of the team would be in attendance supporting by enjoying the raffle. This is a great opportunity to enjoy an evening out and do some “team building” . Tickets are 2.00 per draw, with 4 chances to win… BBQ prizes. We make approximately $5000.00 a year from meat raffle proceeds. If we are unable to sustain this fundraiser, we will be forced to give up our block of raffles and registration fees will be raised to offset the loss in revenue.
Please note, due to AGCO lottery licensing rules, only those 18 and older can participate in the raffles. Children are welcome to attend but cannot purchase or handle the tickets.
You can expect to hear from your team Manager or Coach about your assigned meat raffle date(s)