WHERE IS LACROSSE CANADA’ S AUDITED STATEMENT FOR 2025-26

By Pierre Filion pierrefilion@bell.net

Lacrosse Canada’s 2025-26 fiscal year ended on March 31th 2026. That is four months ago and still Lacrosse Canada has not come forward with the publication of its 2025-26 audited financial statement.

To Lacrosse Canada’s defense we all need to admit that the numerous changes within the organization might have led to this delay; the president (Matt Shearer) has been expelled, the Executive Director (Terry Rayner) has been terminated and the Technical Director (Wendy Dobbin) has also left. There is a new president (Barbara Lockhart), a new CEO (Lori Degraw) and a new Technical Director (Dave Stockton) who have stepped in and who are, somehow, trying to steer what appears to be a rudderless ship.

Those are important changes and surely indicate that questions need to be asked. Especially in the financial domain as we are waiting for the 2025-26 statement. But four months is a long time for the paying members to wait. Someone from Lacrosse Canada is probably trying to answer pointed questions presented by the external auditors! Hopefully the external auditors are asking pointed questions.

Before we go any further let’s remind ourselves what was the 2025-26 budget in order to appreciate the upcoming financial statement.

But, let’s not forget that, under Terry Rayner’s leadership, LC’s two previous financial statements had declared a 194,749$ deficit in 2024 and a devastating deficit of 850,155$ in 2025. Obviously, the corporation’s net asset has melted from 1,127,137$ to 276,982$. This will significantly affect Lacrosse Canada’s ability to invest towards the development of the game. When net assets go down so goes your autonomy! On the other hand, the Lacrosse Foundation will congratulate itself for having protected the monies it now has in the bank. Just imagine how quickly Lacrosse Canada could have ‘’spent’’ this money! Also, the paying members will never forget those deficits and that is why they are waiting patiently for Lacrosse Canada to come up with the latest figures.

The upcoming and expected audit will, you’ll remember, cover 10 months (June 2025 to March 2026). Terry Rayner was the Executive Director during that period until he was released by Lacrosse Canada on February 19^th 2026.

The 2025-26 budget, approved by the members and by the Board, was at 2,426,884$. It was a balanced budget, as always.

What is surprising is that, year in and year out, Lacrosse Canada drafts balanced budget but at the end of the fiscal year ‘’discovers’’ that the approved budget was not followed and that monies were spent as if there was no budget at all. More and more I have the impression that preparing a budget is meaningless when monies can be spent ‘’outside the budget’’ until a deficit is declared.

There was a Board of Directors who seemed to totally and blindly trust the Executive Director; there was a president who signed cheques without asking if ‘’we were within budget’’. And there were the paying members who never received quarterly statements indicating where their monies were being spent.

This happened within a national association (LC) who claimed to be transparent!!!

What is also problematic is that when the audit will be produced it will list revenues and expenses against the previous year’s revenues and expenses. No where will there be an audit that the members could analyze, COMPARE WITH THE INITIAL BUDGET and then proceed to an evaluation of their leaders. And maybe ask questions! And, maybe, receive answers as to why, in two years, ‘’we’’ ran a deficit of 1,044,904$. Who was in charge of the budget? Hey, we’re talking of a million dollars now.

The 2025-26 budget called for revenues of 2,426,884$ with two important contributors supplying 94.1% of the revenues; Sport Canada (1,094,090$) and the members themselves (1,191,105$). Lacrosse Canada was planning to collect 151,689$ by itself while the National Teams were going to bring in a whooping 60,000$.

What will be interesting to see, when the audit comes out, is that in its plan to generate 151,689$ there was an amount of 104,500$ that would come from sponsors and royalties. The previous year Lacrosse Canada had generated 3,000$ in sponsorship and 758$ in royalties for a total of 3,758$. In 2025-26 someone decided that the Association was going to raise 104,500$ in sponsorship and royalties. There is not an ounce of wisdom here and LC has not indicated how it was going to raise 104,500$ in one year when the year before it raised only 3,758$. Let’s get serious here, please.

In the expense part of the budget Lacrosse Canada indicated that it was going to spend 1,078,085$ for the National Teams. That is 44.4% of the budget. But the thrilling part is there was never any indication on how and where the money was going to be spent. Yet Lacrosse Canada goes through great lengths to tell us that it will spend 1,630$ on a website transfer system and 1,000$ on postage but it totally omits to minimally indicate where 44.4% of its expenses was going to be spent. On which team? On which World Lacrosse championship? On which activity? Hey, we’re talking of a million dollars now again.

Practically speaking the Board of Directors gave the Executive Director 1,078,085$ without any guidelines or specific indications on where to spend it. And this is happening in a National Association who wishes to be credible because of its accountability to the members.

No wonder changes are happening at Lacrosse Canada; enough was enough.

In the meantime, let’s wait for the 2025-26 audit to come out and let’s see, when we get it, what can be learned from it. What we already know is that the past Board of Directors failed miserably.