Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark T. DeNucci, Sr.
Publius:
I don't know where you live, BUT, you may be an independent contractor, but if your StateHSAA has a required uniform I would advise you to wear it. The OhioHSAA can fine an official up to $100 for not wearing the correct uniform, i.e., wearing a powder blue or red shirt to umpire a baseball or fastpitch softball game, or wearing the gray with black pinstripe shirts for a basketball game (and I really do prefer the gray shirts over the zebra shirts myself). Meaning, that they can keep you from officiating.
MTD, Sr.
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Where I live,there are no fines. If there were, I would not pay them. If they told me I could not work, we'd have a legal discussion about the extent that adhesion contracts are binding in this context. "If you don't like it, don't work their games" is a cowardly cop-out. They can't just do whatever they want unless you let them. Your rights are worthless if you don't undergo the fatigue of exercising them.
My positions are always about associations--state or local--trying to screw officials by making them take on the detriments of both employees and independent contractors, while keeping the benefits of both for themselves. Officials do themselves no favors by allowing them to do so. I couldn't care less what color my shirt is, but I care greatly about who decides. Local associations in particular ought to be charged with theft for charging dues to officials, and then doing little to nothing to represent their interests.
Associations can--and do--require lots of things that I adhere to without question. Whether they can require a specific uniform--particularly a specific manufacturer--as a condition of granting a "license" (We are not licensed here; merely registered. Licenses are granted by government agencies here. In some states, the state association is a government body; here, it is a not-for-profit agency) as a subterfuge to avoid compliance with maintaining the distinction between employee and independent contractor differs from state to state and may or may not be enforceable.
Since there is no one single item that defines employee or independent contractor, you have to watch what side of the line everything they do falls on. My state association is close to requiring enough to classify them as an employer, and I'm sure they know it. That, and likely not lack of knowledge, keeps them from enforcing some of their "requirements." What I do guarantees that I will never work a state tournament, but does more to benefit
officials than nearly any local association does. They act, by and large, as if they are just subdivisions of the state.
Officials in some areas have traded away some of their rights in return for more money or other benefits, and that's fine. Here, they just let themselves be abused, buying into the practices indicating that officiating is more important than officials.
If associations want to require so much that they fall on the employer side of the line, that's fine, too; they can pay FICA and workman's comp. They want to have their cake, and eat it, too. That, I will not quietly abide. I know most officials love doing games so much that they'll tolerate unneeded burdens to do it. I'm just letting them know they don't always have to.