Huge congratulations to Rico! A well-deserved position!

The Ontario Hockey League has named retired Flint firefighter and founder of the Flint Inner-City Youth Hockey Program Rico Phillips their Director of Cultural Diversity and Inclusion.

His job will be reporting to the OHL's commissioner and to "establish and lead a committee to provide guidance and expertise to the League and teams to help ensure that the game is inclusive for all players, staff and fans."

Phillips has been a high school hockey referee since the 1980s and, along with creating the inner city youth hockey league in Flint, he received the NHL's Willie O’Ree Community Hero Award.

According to the OHL's website, it values "all of its players, staff, and officials and is committed to providing a place where all players and personnel are treated with respect. Not only does this mean that the League strives for an environment that is free from unequal treatment on the basis of race, age, gender, creed, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, marital status or disability – it also means that we strive for an environment where we value and benefit from the distinctiveness of each other."

We had the pleasure of meeting Rico and talking to him several times on the air and he is one of the greatest people that we know. Congrats!

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