The ice in the new rec centre will remain throughout April.
Town council passed a motion to that effect at a special meeting on April 3 based on a recommendation from the Hay River Recreation Committee.
"We have only had our ice in and available for residents for a short period of time," said Judy Goucher, the senior administrative officer with the town. "Normally the season would end toward the end of March, but in order to allow people more time to enjoy the new facility we're extending the ice time to the end of April and we're also going to be putting in the ice earlier in the fall."
The new rec centre opened its doors on March 13, but town residents never got to skate on the ice surface until after the end of the Arctic Winter Games on March 24.
Regular fees began to be applied as of April 4.
Goucher noted that until then the town had provided access to the ice surface at no cost to recognize the patience of community residents and say thank you for waiting while the construction project was underway.
The ice will also be coming back to the rec centre earlier than usual – this year by late summer.
"Sept. 1 is our date when we'll be putting in the ice unless we have confirmed programming, such as a hockey school or something like that, in which case we'll try and accommodate ice earlier sometime in August," said Goucher.
If the arena opens for skating on Sept. 1, she noted that would be about a month earlier than normal.
"Again, we're trying to maximize the time that we have and we budgeted for it," she said. "So we're going to do our best to get the ice in there in the fall as soon as possible."
Goucher said the rink won't be opening in August only for public skating.
Council also decided to allow the gymnastics club to set up its equipment on the curling ice concrete slab once all deficiencies have been addressed by the contractor.
The equipment would remain in place subject to other rentals of the space and subject to reaching agreement on a rental fee for the extended use. In the event that the space is rented out, the town would provide a temporary storage location for the gymnastics equipment.