Sports organizations unite in green arm band initiative to support officials

Several provincial sports organizations in Nova Scotia are uniting to support young officials.

The Green Arm Band Initiative is designed to combat referee, umpire and official abuse in sport.

"Multiple sports have been dabbling with such a program in the last couple of years. But for the first time, we have a unified voice with a unified campaign to curb the amount of abuse our young officials are taking," said Brandon Guenette, executive director of Baseball Nova Scotia.

"To our knowledge, this is the first time we've seen such a cross-sport unified voice in this matter."

Amateur sports are facing a troubling decline in the number of officials, referees and umpires. One of the main reasons for this is the abuse directed at them by athletes, coaches and spectators.

"I don't think any person gets into officiating any sport to get yelled at or harassed," said Guenette. "Why would you stick around if you were constantly subjected to that?"

The eight provincial sports organizations represent baseball, basketball, football, lacrosse, rugby, soccer, softball and volleyball.

The initiative serves as a reminder to respect and protect young officials who are now wearing green armbands.

"Because they are learning the game and learning how to be an authority for the game, they just seem to get a lot of attitude and are scrutinized," said Juan Marquez, Soccer Nova Scotia's referee development officer.

"That attitude and scrutiny is not coming from players. For the most part it's coming from adults. That's the problem."

Young hockey officials in Cole Harbour, N.S., started wearing green arm bands two years ago and it was later adopted by Hockey Nova Scotia.

The measure was brought in because 10,000 hockey officials out of 30,000 across Canada opted to quit during or after the 2021-2022 season.

"We want people to realize what they're actually doing when they're yelling out comments to these young officials," said Guenette.

"They're yelling at someone who is a minor and they're out there just trying to do their best."