Relocation Deadline? UPDATED

UPDATE: I talked to John Grisdale today (Jan 20) and he told me very specifically that there is no relocation deadline and the only December 1rst deadline is for expansion. He told me he thought he had been clear with Brian but if he said there was a relocation deadline (which he did) than he was misspoke. Fair enough. I would think that even if there were a relocation deadline or guideline that the approval of the board of governors would overrule that anyway. I didn't get any of this on tape, I just quickly wanted to clarify the rule and have now done so. It sounds like technically Merritt would be free to move if they got the votes.

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Does anybody know if there is actually a rule in place in the BCHL for a relocation deadline? Right now we have conflicting statements from the league commish John Grisdale. At the end of December he told Merritt blogger Brian Weibe that the deadline was December 1rst. Here's a transcript of the exchange:

Brian Weibe: "Now what is the timeline for something like relocation to happen. Again it might not be specific here to Merritt but I mean is it something that could be possible for the 09-10 season."

John Grisdale: "I can't speak to that specifically, we have a deadline for applications as of December 1rst and there was no application in the league office for that as of December 1rst. I can't speak directly to it again our regulation is December 1rst and there was no application from any franchise on relocation."

However, the commish spoke to Penticton blogger Ryan Pinder today and had a different story. This is what he said to Ryan:

John Grisdale: "We have a regulation in our league that has a date specific to a expansion which is December 1rst of any given year. There's nothing there's no expansion for the BC hockey league in 09-10. As far sale of a franchise or relocation there has been no application from any member club on the sale or relocation of it."

So which is it? It could be that Mr. Grisdale was mistaken when he first told Brian that there was a December 1rst deadline for relocation, but Brian's question was pretty specifically about relocation and not expansion so I'm not sure why there would be a mix up. Could be a simple mistake as I'm sure if you analyzed everything I say that I'd get a ton of things wrong all the time.

I'm not trying to be cheeky, I just want to know if anybody out there knows for sure. I'd call up the commish myself but I'm pretty swamped right now and frankly I don't have his number.