PG Kodiaks president says “Financial crisis” led to Boreham’s dismissal

On February 27, 2026, Prince George Kodiaks Head Coach Jamie Boreham was dismissed from his position, which started a massive change in the organization.

About a week later, three board members, the President, Vice-President and Treasurer stepped down from their positions as well, leaving the organization with plenty of questions.

This led to a new board being elected at the team’s annual general meeting on March 25.

At that meeting, Nicolas Fricke was elected as the team’s president.

“I have been involved with football at various different levels for 28 years now, as a coach, not including my playing background, and I’ve come from impoverished backgrounds where clubs had no money to stand on, I’ve come from programs where they’ve collapsed from in-house fighting, just bad situations,” Fricke said.

“For me to step forward and try to help correct the ship and get it moving where it needs to be, felt right.”

One of the biggest tasks for the new board was addressing the head coach position.

“What happened was, there was some funding issues and we weren’t able to, I saw we as an organization as a whole before the new board, weren’t able to bring in the revenue projected,” Fricke said.

“With that, they had some financial crisis, with financial crisis comes evaluation of costs and justification of salaries and things like that.”

Fricke said former Head Coach Jamie Boreham did plenty of good work for both the program the community.

“As being one of the highest paid coaches in the league, not just the conference, it was a situation where the board needed to really look at what the cost level would be, and they couldn’t justify the cost of the time, so they dissolved the position, which, unfortunately when you dissolve the position, you have to let the person go,” Fricke explained.

“It’s unfortunate, but it was a decision they made at the time with the information that they had. Obviously through all the followings through the public outcry and stuff like that and internal outcry as well, trying to see what we could do to correct it.”

Fricke said the first priority after the annual general meeting was saving the organization.

“If we don’t have anywhere for anyone to go, there’s no sense being here,” he said.

“That was step one, get on stable footing, make sure that the organization could still exist, because we don’t have just CJFL, we have flag, we have youth, we have tackle football at the freshman and varsity level, we run year round, so there’s a lot more to it than just CJFL. I know the CJFL side of it is the glitz and the glamour, and that was what really draws the public eye, but as an organization, we have so much more that we have to protect and have to grow and have to make sure is still around to secure football in Prince George.”

In terms of bringing back Boreham, Fricke said they tried.

“We looked at the financials, we looked at everything, we came up with a couple different solutions because we can’t, as a board, afford what Coach Boreham used to take home. It’s just, at this point, just not feasible,” he explained.

“We came with a couple different solutions, we sat down with Jamie, and we talked to him about a few different things and where he’s at and his family’s at. Unfortunately, the solutions we had weren’t sufficient for him, so he decided that he needs to step away to allow us to grow.”

Fricke said Boreham is continuing to be helpful in the team’s transition, and is continuing to support the team.

“He’s heading up the fundraiser, he’s still raising the banner, he’s still waving the flags, and he’s beating the drum for us,” Fricke said.

“There’s no animosity there, it’s just where he’s at in his life and where we are at financially, we couldn’t coincide.”

General Manager Ryan Bellamy will step into the Head Coach role, and will do so pro-bono this year.

“Where we are financially, that’s a god-send, that helps us a lot,” Fricke said.

“Ryan has so much experience in football and in this community, born and raised in the area, he played in the area, he grew up through the community football, he moved onto other levels and then he came back to coach and he’s done some great things throughout the years for the programs he’s been involved with, so we’re excited to see his leadership and see what he can do for our team.”

Bellamy said for this year, the goal is to try and bring back the players from last year, and continue to grow and move forward.

“There will be some changes on the coaching staff, we’ll probably be a little bit younger than we’ve been in the past,” Bellamy said.

“My focus so far in conversations with potential coaching options is engaging with our alumni, looking to build within. Our strength of having people who’ve come through the program now for a few years, people that have decided to stay in the community with this team, is build local and build through what we’ve had from the player’s that have come through, engaging with the alumni and just really setting a direction forward that’s going to be sustainable for this team in the future.”

In terms of what’s going around online, Bellamy said he’s trying to steer clear of the noise.

“A lot of what’s out there, there’s not a lot of basis to it, it’s a lot of word soup at the end of the day, it has a lot of catchy words that really brings attention to people,” he said.

“But I know what my history is, the people in the community that have dealt with me know what my history is. I’ve always been somebody that’s there for the kids, I’m there for the sport, I’m there for the community, and I think at the end of the day that’s what’s going to rise above everything else.”

When asked if there would be a hit to the fan base, Fricke said there may be a blip for a short period of time.

“I just think back to when Gretzky left Edmonton, my dad cried and cried and cried, and he left his fanbase from Edmonton to LA Kings, because that’s where Gretzky went. We’re going to see the same thing here, where there’s going to be some Boreham fans, that, unfortunately, they’re not going to probably come out for first little bit, they’re going to step away,” Fricke said.

“I think that fact that we’re still pushing to improve football, we’re still growing with Ryan’s leadership, and what we’ll see on the field, I think our fanbase will quickly recover, I don’t think that it’ll be a long-term dip in our fanbase, I don’t believe that.”

Fricke said an audit is ongoing, and they can’t really address it until they have the answers, and they can’t have the answers until the audit is finished.

“We’ve been talking with members of the old board, trying to make sure we have all the records in place so that they can be vetted,” he said.

“That takes time. While we’re waiting for that answer, we still have flag football, we still have youth, we still have our spring camp coming. We have to move forward, we cannot wait for that answer, we have to move forward, and when we get the answers, then we can make decisions on what needs to be done with those answers.”

Fricke said several sponsors from previous years have called to re-up their sponsorships, with some new sponsors coming on board as well.

“We’re seeing community involvement and sponsorship growth,” he said.

“Tera Drost-Eagleson is our fundraising director, and she’s doing an amazing job in getting out there with boots to the ground, really talking to different business, and approaching companies and being approached by companies that have never sponsored before and getting behind because they don’t want to see football leave Prince George.”

As for the next steps, the junior team’s spring camp is set to take place during the weekend of May 8-10.

These comments come from an interview with Fricke and Bellamy conducted today (Friday) by Carol Gass, Country 97fm.