Officials with the Shawano Hockey League are proposing an addition to the Crawford Center, their home rink, with intentions of paying for the project themselves.
Adam Gafner, hockey league board president, offered several options at a June 4 public property committee meeting.
“One of the things that was never implemented into the building was showers,” he said.
A new addition would include larger locker rooms, showers, storage, training areas and a community conference room.
“We could use it for hockey for film with our older levels of teams, but I also think it could be an add-on facility for the community to use throughout the year as a gathering space,” he said of the conference room.
Suggestions included an addition to the west side of the building facing the Huntington building. The roof in this area drops, so an addition would most likely be one level only.
An addition to the north side was offered, although Gafner admitted most people would not like this as it would touch up against the sidewalk and infringe on the area used by the horse show during the county fair.
Another suggestion was made for the east side of the building.
“The actual original kitchen area was supposed to built on that end of the building,” Gafner said. “For whatever reason, it got put on the other end. If this building was ever wanted to be used more as for weddings or events or something like that, that might be a better area to put a new kitchen. Then we could use the current kitchen area, bathroom area, lobby area, that could actually be remodeled into showers, locker rooms, etc.”
An addition could also be put on the south side of the building that would allow for even more storage space.
A fifth option is to remodel space inside the existing Crawford Center for a larger locker room and showers.
“Regarding any of these ideas, we would not be looking to the county to fund any of it,” Gafner said.
Gafner said it would take two or three years to execute the plan, but they want to know if the county is OK with the concept before investing time, effort and money into the project.
County bidding rules would be followed in the construction phase.
Tanya Anker, hockey league board secretary, noted that in the 2025-26 season, Shawano Hockey League hosted four two-day tournaments that brought 55 teams to the community. One concern they heard centered on the capacity of the building.
“We are going to spread that tournament out over three days instead of just two so that we aren’t filing so many people in the building at one time,” she said.
Also, in 2026-27, a fifth tournament will be added, which will also be three days.
Shawano Hockey League had three teams compete at the state tournament in 2025-26.
Committee members agreed to consider the building plans and discuss them further at the July 2 meeting.
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