LEWISTON – Noisemakers are once again welcome at Maineiacs home games and ushers won’t shoo fans away once the game ends.

But City Administrator Jim Bennett said some administrative rules won’t disappear as quickly now that a new temporary management team has taken over control of the Colisee.

“Clearly, this is a social event for a core of people that grew up in that facility, and we want to recognize that,” Bennett said. “We’re trying to make it more professionally run, but we don’t want to take the fun out of it.”

Assistant Fire Chief Paul Leclair was appointed to temporarily replace General Manager Wayne Thornton on Nov. 18. By Nov. 19’s Maineiacs home game, Leclair said he had already eased restrictions on the places fans could stand between periods and after games.

For example, Leclair said ushers now let fans and billet parents stick around after games. Thornton had enacted a policy this year to chase fans and parents out of the building once the game ended, and that didn’t sit well with autograph seekers and people hoping to wish players well.

“It’s not like we’re in a hurry to close,” he said. Colisee maintenance workers need to clean the stands and maintain the ice after the game is over anyway.

“So, we let some people wait around after the game,” Leclair said. “It’s a small thing, but it means a lot for the kids especially.”

Ushers are also more relaxed about getting stragglers to their seats before the game starts.

“We don’t want people to feel herded,” he said. “We still need them to move along, but that problem really takes care of itself. People do want to watch the game from their seats, so we really don’t have to do a lot.”

Bennett said restrictions on noisemakers, air horns and sirens have also been removed.

“We’ll ask people to be respectful of their neighbors, but we would anyway,” Bennett said. “But airhorns and sirens are very appropriate at the right time. This is a hockey game, after all, not a tennis match.”

But Bennett said it’s too late in the season to change a ticket upgrading policy. People cannot pay extra to change a children’s ticket into an adult ticket.

“That was a problem for some season ticket holders,” Bennett said. “If they had tickets for themselves and their kids but couldn’t make a game, they couldn’t give those tickets to adult friends.”

That was done in response to problems the Colisee had last year, where some seats were sold twice. Bennett said he found out about it two weeks before the season began when he was picking up his two adult and two children’s season tickets. He tried to give away tickets for one game to a friend, but learned they would not be able to use the children’s tickets.

“It was an overreaction,” Bennett said. “There has to be a way to just stamp a ticket, collect the difference and let them in.”

But some season ticket holders have already purchased all adult tickets, anticipating they wouldn’t be able to trade children’s tickets.

“Changing that policy now punishes those people, so we’re kind of stuck the policy as it is now,” Bennett said. The Colisee should let people pay to upgrade tickets next season, he said.

Other problems will go away when the team and Colisee managers move out of a trailer in the VIP parking lot later this month and into new offices at the front of the arena. That will let the Colisee move the temporary trailer that’s been there since construction began, freeing a dozen or so parking spaces in the VIP lot.

Leclair doubts the move will take place in time for any December home games, but should be ready when the team returns home on Jan. 5. The Maineiac Pro shop should open about that time, as well.