Arbiter question
 

Can the visiting team see who the officials are for their upcoming games?

Does the visiting team administrator have access to the Arbiter group assigning the officials? Basically, is that admin listed as a contact within that Arbiter group?

Some areas have several officiating groups and they service different schools. If the two schools are part of the same officiating group, then both should be able to see any assigned officials. If the visiting team is from outside of the service area, then they would not be able to access that information.

Yeah, the visiting team is a part of the same group. What happened is that I had games for tomorrow, assigned about a week ago, then was removed from them yesterday. When I inquired why, I was told that I was cut by "one of the participating teams." The visiting team is one with which I have a long and ugly history, so I was not surprised to be cut by them, but the question is why now? The only answer I could think of was that they had just seen who was assigned to the games tomorrow.

I know it sucks to lose a game but you probably didn't want to be on that game anyway. Or your assignor is lying to you.

In SC schools can block up to 8 officials and those blocks are done through Arbiter. Seems to eliminate this issue.

I assign varsity hoops for 24 schools and the first thing I did when I took the job was lose the "Black List" the previous assigner kept. Most of the coaches who put officials there weren't even coaching anymore. The ones that are still coaching probably forgot why they put the officials on the list.

I'm into year 3 now and there's 1 official I will keep away from 1 school and I have good reasons to do so -- yes, there was an incident. There are also some conflicts of interest I know about and simply schedule around. I just did a count so I could send a preseason email -- I have 264 different officials covering 348 varsity games this season and I don't think it serves the greater good in the long term to let coaches decide who won't (or will) be working their games.

I agree with this.

I guess I don't really have an issue with schools blocking officials in my state since officials get a certain number of blocks for schools and partners (I think five "teams" and three partners statewide is what we're permitted). "Teams" meaning that if you block a school's JV and varsity, that counts as two blocks. Since we almost always work doubleheaders, you can't block girls or boys teams specifically. Only "levels." I only have one partner blocked and a lot of other officials have the same guy blocked, as well. I haven't blocked any teams because the way I see it, if a school doesn't like me, they can get rid of me at the expense of one of their allotted blocks. I'm not going to use mine.

Did you download a copy of your Arbiter assignment for that game when you first accepted it?

As far as the OhioHSAA and the MichiganHSAA is concerned, a copy of your Arbiter assignment is considered a valid contract. If the game has not been canceled and for whatever reason an official is removed for the game, he or she cannot be removed from the game without having his or her contract bought out.

MTD, Sr.

Seriously? And having heard the whole story this is the way you would handle this?

I know I would be expecting a check.

I disagree. If you're cut, you're cut. If the association policy is to allow the school to make this cut at any point, then that's the way it is. I'm a member of the association. It's one night. It's not a big deal.

Terrible. If the school didn't pay you I would as an assigner.

Just Another Ref:

Evidently, you think it is okay for one of the parties to a contract to breach the contract just because it feels like it without suffering an consequences.

Like Rich said I would be expecting a check. Why? Because I signed a contract to provide that school with certain services. By signing that contract I promised said school that I would not officiate for any other school but them on that date and time. Now said school wants somebody else to officiate thereby depriving me compensation that I would have earned if I had been able to officiate else where. I can also ensure you that if you had breach the contract with said school said school would be coming after you for the breach of contract penalty.

MTD, Sr.

You're assuming the official actually signed a contract with the school.

Here, we don't. So, there isn't a contract to be broken. There are some policies about cancellations with short notice when the official has already traveled to the game site, but aside from that, there hasn't been anything. Our state officials organization has been negotiation for a little better in that cancellations less then some number of hours before the game time would still be paid something.

If a school contacts our assignor to request that a certain official not be on their game, he's likely to not entertain the request at all unless there is a good reason. If he does, he's just going to switch the official with an official on another similar game, if there is one. No one loses anything.

It is if you work for multiple supervisors and you close them out for that date. Your association should have policies in place as far as time limitations when someone can be arbitrarily removed from a game. If a school has you blocked, then Arbiter should be managed so that you never get an assignment involving that school.

I would be having a meeting with the executive board if I were arbitrarily removed from a game so close to game time.