Former mayor refuses to blame Bulls loss on anyone

By Lashaina Blair-White and Mo Cranker

BELLEVILLE – An Ontario Hockey League team cannot work in a market that does not have community support, former mayor Neil Ellis says.

Ellis’s comments Wednesday came after the news broke last week of the Belleville Bulls being relocated to Hamilton. The move will come at the end of the Bulls’ season this year.

The Bulls have hovered around last place in average attendance in the OHL since the 2008-09 season, and even in that year their attendance was 13th out of 20 teams. Ellis said this cannot happen if a team wants long-term success.

Ellis served as mayor of Belleville from 2006 to 2012 and while in office he and his council decided that building the Quinte Sports and Wellness Centre was the top priority for Belleville. Upgrades to the Yardmen Arena, where the Bulls play, were slated for 2017.

In an interview with QNet News, Ellis said he now believes that a multi-purpose entertainment complex like Kingston’s K-Rock Centre is the best option, for the city but added that even the most modern facilities do not guarantee sustained fan support.

“Some will come back and say, ‘Well, a new arena will bring people back.’ Well, maybe at first, because you want to see the new arena. Eventually that’s going to go away. You need a product. You need a town that wants to enjoy hockey. And maybe having a second chance we would be able to support a team if that chance comes,” he said.

“If you don’t have 3,000 set fans at every game, the team’s not going to make it – that’s the bottom line. You could build the nicest facility, or renovate the Yardmen, and in four years we could be sitting here and saying, ‘The fans are back to 2,000.’ ”

Asked where blame should be placed for the Bulls’ relocation, he said Belleville shouldn’t focus on that.

“Some people will say this, some people will say that. I’m not here to lay blame on anybody. It’s the bottom line. If you don’t have a certain amount of people sitting in on any given event, the venue isn’t going to be successful.”

Ellis’s time as Belleville’s mayor ended on Dec. 1 of last year when Taso Christopher was sworn in. A large part of Christopher’s election campaign was to keep the Bulls in Belleville. He stated his view on the Bulls in this video before the election.

This week, Christopher responded to the relocation of the Bulls with a statement on the city’s website.

“I spoke with David Branch, OHL commissioner, and told him how profoundly sad and disappointed we were that these decisions had been made without any consultation with our municipality,” the letter said.

Ellis said he believes that the city could have been blindsided by the decision, but that the deal had to have been in the works for a long time.

Bulls owner Gord Simmonds spoke with Ellis while he was in office about local ownership for the Bulls, but nothing came of it, Ellis.