BC Wheelchair Sports Return to Sport Update - June 26, 2020

BC Wheelchair Sports Return to Sport Update – June 26, 2020
massive-dev | June 26, 2020

BC Wheelchair Sports is pleased to announce the release of our Return to Sport Guidelines for Wheelchair Tennis and Wheelchair Athletics.

The release of the Return to Sport Guidelines is our first step towards a phased return to wheelchair tennis and wheelchair athletics programming in the province and will allow our many clubs and programs throughout the province to begin the work to return to sport and allow for the resumption of small group training in wheelchair athletics and wheelchair tennis.

Clubs and programs MUST have approval from BCWSA before proceeding with the resumption of wheelchair tennis and wheelchair athletics programming. All wheelchair tennis and wheelchair athletics programs must follow our Return to Sport Guidelines and provincial health guidelines in order to be protected by the recent Ministerial order for sport organizations available here.

The ministerial order protects amateur sport organizations and their representatives from damages resulting, directly or indirectly, from COVID-19 for amateur sports. For example, a sport organization or its representatives will not be liable for a participant in their sports program being exposed to COVID-19 as a result of participation. It is important for sport organizations to understand that the protection will only be in place so long as the organizations follow all applicable guidance including viaSport’s Return to Sport Guidelines, BC Public Health Orders and Guidelines on how to prevent the spread of the virus AND all Return to Sport Guidelines distributed their Provincial Sport Organization (in this case BCWSA). LSO’s, Clubs or Programs who do not adhere to all of the above guidelines exactly will not be protected from liability.

The order and protections will be in place so long as BC is in a Provincial State of Emergency. BCWSA will communicate any changes or updates to the order as they become available.

Throughout this process, the health and safety of our members and community remains our first priority and is at the core of our strategy and decision making.

Please note that while the Province of BC may be entering Phase 3 of the BC Restart Plan. We are only in Level 2 of our Wheelchair Tennis and Wheelchair Athletics Return to Sport Plans and remain in Level 1 for Wheelchair Rugby. As a result, all of our Wheelchair Rugby programs remain suspended while we continue to work on our Return to Sport plan

To answer any questions and support our members in the above process we will be hosting a Virtual Town Hall on Tuesday June 30th at 2:00PM for Wheelchair Tennis and 3:30pm for Wheelchair Athletics to provide some more information and to answer any questions or listen to any concerns you might have at this time. To RSVP to the Town Hall, contact the coordinator responsible for your sport via the contact information at the bottom of this page.

In addition to the Return to Sport Guidelines for Wheelchair Tennis and Wheelchair Athletics, BC Wheelchair Sports has also published a new Illness Policy and an Outbreak Protocol that all of our programs will have to follow, those new policies are available to read by clicking here and are also accessible at the bottom of this page.

BCWSA has also developed new Waiver and Assumption of Risk documents that will replace all previous waivers used by the organization. Everyone engaged in programs or events supported by BCWSA will need to sign these new waivers. The two documents are available at the bottom of this page.

We’d like to thank all of the athletes, coaches, volunteers and community members who have provided us with valuable feedback throughout this process and appreciate your patience and understanding as we work towards a new normal and get back to the sports that we love and enjoy so much

We will have more programming updates in the coming weeks that will be posted on our website, in our newsletter, and on our social media channels.

You can view the Return to Sport Guidelines for Wheelchair Tennis and Wheelchair Athletics on our COVID-19 and Return to Sport Page as well as the viaSport Sport Specific Guidelines page.

For more information on Wheelchair Tennis and to sign up for Tuesday’s Town Hall, please contact:
Senior Program Coordinator Michelle McDonell | michelle@bcwheelchairsports.com

For more information on Wheelchair Athletics and to sign up for Tuesday’s Town Hall, please contact:
Program Coordinator Ana Karanovic | ana@bcwheelchairsports.com