In short, this is a non-profit charity in name only. This is a AAA hockey organization used to enrich the owner, Mr. Thompson Smith, and hockey director, Mr. Angelo Ricci. Their method is "mandatory" fund raising that increases a families normal tuition by 30%. They use threats to keep member families in line. Parents of young players who dare to ask for finacial statements or how the "donations" were used find their sons removed from the team. At one point I was handed over $1000 worth of Denver University hockey tickets. The Thunderbirds would make $5 off of each ticket sold. I was told to sell all the tickets or I would owe the face value of the tickets to the Thunderbirds.
On our team alone, the 12 year old team, no less than three families were threatened with having their sons removed from the team unless they got in line with the program.
The tuition for the 2010-2011 season was $4200 per player. Once we joined we found there was an additional $2000 in mandatory fund raising. I'm not sure why they didn't require a $6200 tuition unless this is an IRS tax dodge of some kind.