Author: MIFA

Dear MIFA Community, 

With the green light of Phase 3 at the beginning of this month, MIFA and the Volunteer Executive have developed a COVID-19 Back to Sport plan that is thoughtful, thorough, inclusive and identifies short and long-term goals for igniting football and fitness in our community while also doing our part in preventing a second wave.

MIFA has been following the advice of the: Government of Ontario, Government of Canada, City of Toronto, Peel Public Health, Peel Regional Police, Town of Oakville, City of Burlington and the City of Mississauga during the pandemic and has taken significant protocols to ensure the safety of participants and the community.

While we hope to bring the same tradition of MIFA programming and events, our programs will have additional measures in place that must be adhered to by all participants. Through our Back to Sport plan, our goal is to return to football to normal or near-normal operations. 

Part of the Back to Sport plan includes and addresses the following items:

• Restoring football programs while keeping participants and fans safe and following public health directives 
• Incorporate positive changes and efficiencies for registration and additional processes
• Screening volunteers, participants and other members when entering facilities and areas of programming with a temperature gun that was invested into by MIFA
• Cleaning all equipment and items used during programming with a commercial with a specialized anti-COVID-19 cleaner
• Ensuring all MIFA participants sign a COVID-19 waiver before participating in programming
• Rescheduling and being adaptable with programming to a future date should be required by public health directives

We have all felt the effects of the pandemic over the last few months and we ask that all participants be patient as we work to adjust to our new normal. Our strengths as a strong Executive and community organization will ensure that any programs that need to be moved to a future date- will be communicated accordingly through the right channels and at a reasonable time. 

During any adjustments, MIFA programs will move as a unit as the Executive plans and assigns new dates and times, with information ready for distribution to participants. As a result, there will be no option for refunds of any kind, as has always been the policy of programs, as the programs require all participation in order to be successful for everyone. Funds will be forwarded to future games and dates. Should COVID-19 require us to shift programs to a significantly later date, MIFA programs will offer a credit of the value of what was paid to be applied to the future season and or program fees. 

Should someone come in a MIFA program have contracted COVID-19, MIFA will consult and communicate with groups and stakeholders immediately and mitigate the issue as quickly as possible. With our screening protocols in place, our goal is to ensure the safety of all participants from the outright. 

MIFA Exec

Melissa Stolarz to direct MIFA women’s tackle program

COMMUNITY Apr 26, 2019 Mississauga News

The Mississauga Indoor/International Football/Fitness Association (MIFA) recently announced the new Director for MIFA Allstars women’s tackle football program. Melissa Stolarz was appointed as the Director at the start of April through a unanimous vote from the executive team at MIFA.

“Melissa has connected with this program immensely and has proven to us and made it clear to me that she will do whatever it takes to keep the first ever women’s team in Ontario involved in community and stronger than ever,” said Liston Bates, head coach of the women’s team.

Stolarz has been a volunteer of MIFA for the past three years as a voting member. Now as a director, she will be at the forefront of leading the program to new levels and opportunities.

“I’m excited to take on this role to support women in football. I don’t play or participate on the team, but I believe in this program and in the community oriented values that MIFA is based upon. This year I will work to have new sponsors on board, new opportunities to grow the sport provincially and internationally, and with the dedication of coaches, volunteers and players, to continue to build a strong core to work from,” Stolarz said.

“I look forward to my role and continuing discussions with governing bodies such as the CFL and Football Canada in hopes to have our athletes play for team Canada one day.”

Stolarz hopes to bring her background of community service work to her new role, including her experience volunteering on the Heritage Advisory Committee at the City of Mississauga, her role as chair of marketing for the National Newspaper Association and emceeing at various community events including Carassauga.

In addition, Stolarz has volunteered her time for the Oakville Marathon, Oakville Rangers Hockey Team and recently with the Ontario Women’s Hockey Association.

MIFA Allstars has been noted as the first and only women’s tackle football team in all of Ontario and its unique program has helped women develop skills in learning and playing the sport.

“The startup process has been a fatiguing one for the past three years but we were able to build a core group of loyal players and I’m certain with the resources Melissa brings to the table, there is no doubt we will break even more barriers,” Bates said.

The team travels both provincially and internationally to compete and is continuously striving for more opportunities to grow the sport for women. For more information on MIFA, visit the club’s Instagram page.

Sudbury Star, Ben Leeson

A volunteer for the Sudbury Spartans for nine years, Tracy Levesque is a fixture on the sideline for the local Northern Football Conference entry.

But though she hadn’t stepped onto the field itself for nearly a decade and a half, Levesque missed her playing days, first in the Joe Macdonald Youth Football League, then with the Sudbury Secondary School boys team.

“My brother, Trevor Levesque, played the first six years, when Joe Mac first started,” Levesque recalled. “He played for Central City and had five championships in six years. After standing around watching him play for three, four, five years, I decided, hey, I want to have a crack at that. My dad told me I had to put some weight on before he was going to let me play football and apparently I did, so he let me play the next year. My brother and I actually played together on the same team during my first year.”

She was standing near Spartans head coach Junior Labrosse last year when Liston Bates, program co-ordinator for MIFA Football, which oversees the NFC’s Oakville Longhorns, approached the Sudbury staff about sending players to suit up for the MIFA All-Stars in the International Bowl against Team America.

When Bates mentioned MIFA also had a women’s tackle team, she could hardly contain her excitement.

“I poke the person next to me, the trainer or equipment manager for the Longhorns, and I say, ‘Hey, how do you get on the women’s team?’ He elbows Liston and he says, ‘Hey, she wants to be on the women’s team.’ Liston looks at me and he goes, ‘You play football? Alright, here’s my number.’ ”

A few weeks later, she stepped in at cornerback for their game against Mexico.

“It was amazing,” she said. “I was nervous, because my last active year in football was 2003, so I hadn’t played in about 14 years, I was really out of shape and I wasn’t expecting to ever play football again, but when the opportunity came, he was like, ‘By the way, we play Mexico in like three weeks.’ ”

Levesque thoroughly enjoyed the experience, however, and is disappointed she won’t be able to accompany the team on a trip to Mexico this weekend. She does, however, plan to join the MIFA squad for games in Oakville and Montreal later this year.

She’s one of a handful of Greater Sudburians on the roster, part of a group that includes Kirsi Fahey and Melissa Tardibuono. A few more come from North Bay.

“We get a lot of respect, because we travel down almost every other weekend for practices,” Levesque said. “It’s all at our own expense, we pay for practices if we have to book an indoor field, we pay for our own player fees. Some of the girls have sponsorships and I’m personally going after sponsorships here in town.”

Bates is impressed with the players’ dedication, as well as with their willingness to assist one another with travel expenses and even provide out-of-town players with places to stay.

“We have players coming from all over Ontario,” Bates said. “It’s great that people from all over Ontario are working together and connecting and coming together under one roof.”

In addition to the Longhorns semi-pro team and men’s all stars, MIFA has long-running flag and winter indoor programs. In the youngest divisions, Bates said, registration of females has actually outpaced that of males.

“That’s huge, because we were targeting that,” he said. “That started going up to adult co-ed flag. We started getting the moms of the kids we coached and someone made the comment, hey, imagine if we could get them in pads. I said that was always a vision, but I didn’t see how we could play. So we created an international circuit to play an International Bowl game against one country that is serious about tackle football, which is Mexico. We took a team down there last May and played in Mexico, and it was a huge experience for a lot of women. We lost, but we came back and social media started going nuts with women asking to join and we actually doubled in numbers within a few weeks.”

Levesque is trying to keep that growth going by encouraging other locals to sign up.

“It’s fantastic,” Levesque said. “It’s hard to get the program to grow, because a lot of women don’t think they can do it, but it’s not hard.”

She encourages anyone interested in women’s tackle to give it a try.

“Just give it a shot,” she said. “What’s the worst that’s going to happen? It’s all about teaching, the women are very close with each other, we try to help each other a lot, which is nice, and the more the program grows, the easier it’s going to be on the girls who are a part of the team already.”