Soccer nets should be anchored, says proposed law that honours teen

Thestar.com
September 10, 2018
Kristin Rushowy

Garrett Mills was at a local park, having fun with his friends, doing a chin-up on the crossbar of a soccer net when it toppled over, killing him instantly.

It’s a tragedy his parents don’t want any other family to go through -- and one a proposed new law addresses by mandating movable soccer nets be secured.

Garrett Mills, 15, was killed by a soccer net that fell on him, a death his family and local MPP say could have been prevented if there were rules forcing municipalities to secure all soccer nets. MPP Todd Smith has proposed a private member's bill doing just that.

Garrett’s Legacy Act would force organizations and municipalities to ensure nets are anchored either to the ground if outdoors, or the floor or wall, or weighted down if indoors.

“He was a 15-year-old boy just out having fun -- he wasn’t even playing soccer,” said Bay of Quinte MPP and Government House Leader Todd Smith, who first introduced the legislation after learning of the Napanee teen’s death and speaking to the boy’s parents.

“He was just out with a friend and girlfriend, doing a chin-up. You never expect something as catastrophic … it hit home for me as a parent, and for every parent. It was something so preventable.”

The net that killed Garrett was 200 pounds, but some can weigh as much as 600, “and can really tip over with a gust of wind, the push of a finger,” added Smith. “The anchors are out there, manufacturers make them available, and they really should be anchored.”

Mills, who died in 2017, is not the first Ontario teen to be fatally injured. In 2014, 15-year-old Jaime Palm died after a net overturned and she suffered severe head trauma. The soccer player from Newmarket later succumbed to her injuries.

More than 50 people have died in similar accidents across North America in the past 40 years.

Conservative MPP Stan Cho (Willowdale) recently reintroduced the private member’s bill, which Smith first proposed in 2017 but didn’t pass before the election.

Cho said he was “totally flabbergasted when I heard these weren’t anchored to the ground.”

The bill has passed second reading with the support of all parties, and Cho is hoping it will become law before the end of the year.

Former Toronto Lynx goalie Theo Zagar -- now technical director of the East York Soccer Club -- said he remembers practising with the team back in 2000 at the old Varsity Stadium when heavy winds toppled the movable net behind him.

“The winds were so hard -- the net landed about five centimetres away from my heels,” he said. “Imagine if I was just one step back. When I hear the story about (Garrett Mills), it triggers that memory.”

He said all of the outdoor fields his East York teams play or practise on have built-in nets. While movable ones are convenient, especially for indoor facilities, in a public setting they must be tethered or weighted down with sandbags for safety, he said.

Alan Gould, executive director of the Toronto Soccer Association, said it “welcomes all measures that aid a safe environment for play for our children.

“This responsibility is shared between facility owners/operators, facility renters (clubs), coaches, and match officials. We should all be willing to work together to ensure this tragic accident does not happen again and we commend Garrett’s family for their efforts in bringing the legislation into being.”

Garrett’s parents said they were shocked when they received the phone call about their son’s accident -- they couldn’t understand how he could have sustained such serious injuries from a soccer net.

The emergency room doctors told them Garrett’s skull was crushed and he died instantly. “He was gone -- just like that,” said Dave Mills, who along with wife Gwen was at the Ontario Legislature when the bill was first proposed and then again when it was reintroduced.

“We had no chance to say goodbye, no one last hug. Fifteen years of having him as our son was over.”

Dave Mills said that before his son died, “out of the blue, he asked ‘what’s a legacy?’ I did my best to explain to him that it’s kind of like a reputation that someone leaves behind after they are gone … he contemplated that for a moment and then said ‘when I go, I want to leave a legacy.’ Four days later, he was gone.”

In the Quinte area, local officials quickly ensured all nets were secured. Yukon also has legislation mandating anchored nets, as do a few American states.

Smith said there is a lot of support for the proposed act, while “it won’t bring closure to the Mills family, they would love to see this pass so that no other family in Ontario has to go what they’ve gone through this past year and a half.

“They’ve been a brave family in talking about this, and lobbying for this.”

He said the intent of the bill is not to penalize, “but to make (people) aware of something they should be doing.”