State, Dover officials rally support for ice rink project

Eleven-year-old Kason Moore of Laurel fell in love with hockey when he attended a Washington Capitals game with his family when he was 5, and he began playing for the Delmarva Raptors in a youth hockey league.

“It really inspired me,” he said March 18 outside Dover City Hall, where he gathered with dozens of Raptors players, their families and others who will be displaced by the closing of the state fair’s Centre Ice Rink in Harrington. 

The event was billed as a discussion on the future of ice skating and ice hockey in Kent County. 

The mayor and state legislators rallied support for a permanent ice rink in Dover, but the families were upset they could not get one more season at Centre Ice Rink. A temporary rink planned in Dover next winter is uncertain, and funding for a permanent facility is unclear.

“We are proceeding forward to get ice back in Kent County,” Mayor Robin Christiansen told the crowd. 

“We are all here to get our kids skating again,” said Sen. David G. Lawson, R-Marydel. “You’ve got to put the heat on, you’ve got to put the pressure on to make sure this happens … You know your legislators; give them a call.”

Lawson conceded that the funding is uncertain.

“I can’t promise you ice by October,” he said. “That window has come and gone. But we’re still trying to get you on ice as quickly as we can.”

“We’re doing the best we can,” Christiansen said.

“I know it’s probably not the exact news you wanted to hear today, but like Sen. Lawson and Mayor Christiansen said, we’re still fighting, but you guys need to help us fight,” said Rep. Shannon Morris, R-Camden. “We have to get the funding done, get the permits moving along. We’re all on the same page of wanting to see you guys, gals back on the ice. And it's going to happen.”

Lawson said state funding options will be pursued for the $18 million facility that would have two rinks, and the first discussions are expected next week.

With the funding, design and local permits yet to come, the soonest a facility could open is spring 2026, Lawson said. He noted that state and private funding could not be mixed, so the money has to come from one or the other.

The city has agreed to donate space in Schutte Park for the rink that would serve the public and become the home of the semi-pro Delaware Thunder team, which has been idle since it left Centre Ice in 2023. 

Christiansen said he still hopes to open a temporary skating rink at Schutte Park late this year.

“The jury is still out on that,” Christiansen said March 19. “We’re working to get ice somehow.” 

The Centre Ice Rink is scheduled to close at the end of the current season due to the high cost of maintaining aging equipment that has needed expensive repairs. Despite the pleas of several people March 18 to raise money to make improvements to keep the rink open for one more season, state fair General Manager Danny Aguilar said the board of directors’ January decision is final. The rink would need an estimated $600,000 in repairs to reopen in September, he said.

“The board is very much committed to get this facility up and running,” Aguilar said of a facility in Dover.

The fair board donated or loaned equipment to assist the users of Centre Ice in setting up another ice rink elsewhere.

Sharon Bark of Smyrna, who has been playing hockey since she was 8 and has been playing for 12 years in the G League at Centre Ice, attended the March 18 gathering and said afterward she was upset about the lack of progress.

“I’m 61,” Bark said. “If I’ve got to hang my skates up for a year, I’m probably not coming back out. Neither will a lot of my players. So, it's not just hitting the kids. It’s hitting the adults.”

Other rinks are more than an hour away and they don’t have space for more teams, she said.

After the more formal part of the event was over and officials took photographs with the young hockey players wearing their jerseys, parents peppered them with questions and asked to be allowed to raise funds for temporary repairs, pleading for more time.

Lawson questioned whether the governor and some legislators from outside Kent and Sussex counties backed the Dover ice rink project. Support for the project and its funding have waned in the last month, he said.

“This is lip service versus reality,” Lawson said. “The lieutenant governor is on board, absolutely is. I don’t know where the governor is. We all heard from him at a meeting. ‘I’m on board.’ Then poof, he disappeared.” 

Meanwhile, players and families have many questions about the future of ice sports in the area.

An only child, Kason Moore said the Raptors are like a family to him and he would miss playing.

“I would probably look at other sports, but not really,” he said. “I would just keep watching the NHL, the Capitals, and just wait until we get it back.”