RAPID CITY - Tuesday's Professional Hockey Players Association declaration of a strike against the Central Hockey League caught Rapid City Rush officials by surprise, but team general manager Jason Rent expressed confidence Wednesday night that training camp for the 2008-2009 season would open as scheduled next week.

The PHPA, established in 1967 representing minor league players in a major league sport, represents players in the American Hockey League and East Coast Hockey League as well as the CHL.

Talks on an initial collective bargaining agreement between the PHPA and the CHL began soon after the PHPA was certified to represent the leagues's players in April.

"It was a shock to us," said Rent of the strike announcement. "We thought negotiations were going pretty good. This is all part of labor negotiations."

In a Tuesday release on the PHPA Web site, executive director Larry Landon said the association had declared a strike "effective immediately against the CHL and its member teams" citing what Landon called after the league's "meaningless deadlines, broken promises, and hollow resources, which have all contributed to unproductive collective bargaining."

Landon said the league had not responded on issues concerning salary cap, off-ice insurance, daily per diem and travel reimbursement.

"On May 22, we submitted a new standard player contract proposal to the CHL owners modeled on the player contracts in the NHL, AHL and ECHL. It did not contain any provisions which were out of the ordinary or inconsistent with recognized practices in professional hockey. Although we have repeatedly asked for the owners to respond to our SPC proposal, and although many promises have been made to us about a pending answer to our requests, the CHL owners have offered nothing," Landon stated in the release. "It is all too obvious that there is no willingness to negotiate even these basic contract provisions."

In a statement released Wednesday, CHL commissioner Duane Lewis said progress had been made on an initial agreement and talks were continuing.

"We are disappointed that the PHPA has taken this step at this point in the negotiations," said Lewis. "The CHL is, and has been, negotiating in good faith with the PHPA and have already come to agreement on many issues benefiting the players. Some of which have been instituted already. There are many critical issues to both sides that cannot be negotiated in a short timeframe."

Lewis said representatives from the league and the player's association met four times over the summer discussing an initial agreement, and said previous negotiations between the PHPA and similar hockey leagues have taken as long as 15 months to be completed.

"This is not a quick process," said Lewis. "We have worked for 16 seasons to build rapport with the players and feel from their accounts in the past that we have been successful in doing this. To the best of the league's knowledge there has been no vote of the majority of players to authorize a strike. We are confident we will be playing hockey on Oct. 17."

Eric Nelson, whose five-year pro career has been mostly in the ECHL before signing with the Rush during the summer, said he's as close to a player representative as the Rush has at the moment.

"As far as we know, no player is aware of any vote, calling for a strike," Nelson said. "We're just here to play hockey, that's what we want to do is play hockey for Rapid City. The situation here is one of the best in the CHL. The owner's done a lot to bring a game, a team and a championship to Rapid City."

Many of the 17 players signed by the Rush have been in Rapid City for several weeks. Four players are participating in AHL training camps. Many of the remaining players arrived in Rapid City Wednesday, according to Rush media relations director Daniel Nieves.

"They're all in town and nobody has packed up and left," Rent said. "If the guys show up for physicals on Saturday, that tells me that they want to play hockey and on Monday is camp."

The Rush is scheduled to play a pair of preseason games in Colorado on Oct. 10 and OCt. 11 in preparation for the regular season opener against the Colorado Eagles on Oct. 17.

"It's business as usual as far as we are concerned," Rent said.