History of Cowichan Valley Minor Hockey Association
The Cowichan Valley Minor Hockey Association was formed and registered in 1986. Prior to 1986, we had three separate Minor Hockey Associations that found it very difficult to compete with other Island Associations. They tried taking turns carding teams to form a higher calibre of competitive teams, but due to a multitude of reasons, this didn't turn out consistent teams.
A very hard working forward thinking group of community leaders got together and formed CVMHA as an amalgamated Association of the former Duncan, Fuller Lake and Kerry Park Associations. The former Associations became clubs, or branches, within the CVMHA. The amalgamation proved successful in making consistently stronger competitive teams, but also had drawbacks with so many different executive committees under the CVMHA leadership. In 1996 another club was created under CVMHA, and it was the Rep Club. The CVMHA Rep Club looked after all of the competitive teams, which enabled the CVMHA meetings to be shorter and more concerned with all of hockey, rather than having to deal with Rep issues. This seemed to smooth things out for a few years, but with all the executives at the club level it was still quite challenging to organize Association business. Some clubs were very good at understanding that they were governed by CVMHA, yet others always seemed to have a problem with it.
For many years a core group of CVMHA Executive members felt the answer was to run CVMHA like every other Association in the Province, with one Executive body and no clubs or branches. It took many years to see this happen, but finally in 2003 it was accomplished, and CVMHA was truly one organization. This hasn't been without challenges, as we knew we would experience growing pains, and we have. As the years unfold and the Executive sees the areas that need improvement, changes will be made to improve our efficiency and add to our hockey programs. It took almost 20 years for CVMHA to evolve into a true Association and hopefully our members will understand the need for patience and assistance in working out the kinks. The rest of the Country and Province can't be wrong, so we know we're on the right track. The challenges are always the same; everyone seems to want more ice time and costs kept to a minimum. Unfortunately these things don't go hand in hand, more ice means higher costs or mandatory fundraising, as other organizations do. There is a very dedicated group of volunteers that make up our executive committee, coaching staff, referees, and team managers, and without any one of these parts, wecan't provide hockey for our 1100 members.
We hope to continue to evolve, as one of the top 5 largest Associations in the Province we have a lot to be proud of, and thankful for.