A Rat

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Rich

A college official being held back cause of older officials blocking their progress.

Time shoukd mean nothing in getting good assignments. If the officials are good enough but not getting games because they're being blocked by older people I don't blame them from moving on.

Exactly. Wanna know why there’s a shortage of high school officials? Well, one of the reasons is because of crap like this.

Seniority means something, but at the end of the day if your best officials aren’t getting a shot, don’t be surprised when something like this happens.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by Nevadaref

Competition is the American way.
Numerous successful companies began because an employee became disgruntled with the current leadership and decided that it was better to depart, start his own business, and do it better.

There is nothing wrong with what is taking place in your area. Competition will sort it out.

As far as elections go, I've found that true democratic votes don't usually serve the best interests of an officiating association.

For example, if the group has 30% varsity officials and 70% subvarsity officials, understand that your group will be governed by the 70% who do not work varsity contests. If you elect an assignor, the subvarsity guys will dictate who that assignor will be. Will that be best for the varsity officials?

Another situation would be if an association has 20 truly top officials and another 20 who are second tier, an elected assignor will be obligated to keep as many of those happy as possible in order to get re-elected. This can lead to some lesser officials getting games that they shouldn't.

Situations like the above lead to frustration by some officials and can spur people to break away and form their own officiating group.

The problem with tilting the bylaws to give varsity officials a disproportionate say in elections, etc. is that it leads to people being held down as in the OP's scenario.

The longer I live in Wisconsin (17th season out of 32 now), the more I appreciate the value of no association controlling all of the game assignments. I've asked an association to hire for six of my schools (I assign for 23 schools at the varsity level), but we have an agreement that those assignments should be made with an eye toward giving people opportunities. Most conferences here are hired by commissioners who are hired by the schools. Schools typically hire their own subvarsity officials, but many of them have outsourced those assignments to other people. Associations can get involved through this outsourcing and it's a win/win as people gain experience and schools have their games covered.

None of us will be around forever. My knee is telling me that every day. We need to do what's best for officiating and not be self-serving and drive people away. Putting the best official on the best game isn't always what's best for the sport and what's best for officiating.

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by JRutledge

Totally agree. I get why this happens or people think this is the a good thing on the surface, but when it is about the person that assigns in your group and that relationship with the group is strained, then this is what can and will happen.

Peace

The more I hear about drama that happens in associations that have assigning authority, the more I wish we had the college-style arrangement that your state has.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by SC Official

The more I hear about drama that happens in associations that have assigning authority, the more I wish we had the college-style arrangement that your state has.

They're not all like that. Probably not even most.

And what do you mean like college-style? Here, it is one assignor for 200-300+ miles in all directions that has all of the D3 and NAIA schools and one that has a few of the JC's. College, here, is far more restricted than HS. A person can find 20-30 (or more) different HS associations in the area of 2 college assignors.

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Camron Rust

They're not all like that. Probably not even most.

And what do you mean like college-style? Here, it is one assignor for 200-300+ miles in all directions that has all of the D3 and NAIA schools and one that has a few of the JC's. College, here, is far more restricted than HS. A person can find 20-30 (or more) different HS associations in the area of 2 college assignors.

Conferences hire their own assigner. That is what I mean by college-style. Thought that was pretty obvious in context.

Problem is in my state, schools don’t form conferences.

[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by SC Official

The more I hear about drama that happens in associations that have assigning authority ...

My local IAABO board (it's actually the elected executive committee) hires an assigner on a one year contract, $32,025.00 for 2018-19. Been that way for thirty-eight years, and probably longer.

I'm a journeyman official and I can't complain, I get a full schedule, including many high level games, usually as the umpire with a high level partner.

I never hear any complaining from the younger officials, probably because of our new evaluation system that does away with years of experience and goes with evaluations by a highly trained committee.

Our assignment system is ripe for problems, in 100% IAABO Connecticut, if one wants to officiate interscholastic games anywhere in the two counties we cover, there's only one assigner, it's a really restrictive monopoly.

And except for those grandfathered in, one can only work in the county where one resides, so unlike Bonnie and Clyde often did, we can't cross county lines.

But it works. We have a both great assigner, and a great evaluation system.

Many officials usually want more games. Well, as they often say, be careful what you wish for.

Last season, due to weather reschedules, during one week in February I worked Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights. For the first time ever, I had to do laundry in midweek, or I would run out of uniforms. For the first time in my career I had too many games, I couldn't wait for Sunday to get a night off.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Conferences hire their own assigner. That is what I mean by college-style. Thought that was pretty obvious in context.

You're making some assumptions. Your context implied that being college gave the officials a choice of who to work for. Just being college doesn't make that true when the conferences hire the same assignor.

[Kelvin green]

Originally Posted by Terrapins Fan

I've held my tongue as long as I can. I'd like the opinions of fellow members here.

In March of last season, we elected officers for this season. The President for the 2017-18 season lost. He did not take losing well. ( BTW, He lost 67% to 33% it wasn't close) He broke many of our by laws by going to the area schools and soliciting games for a new officials association that he planned to form. But he hadn't resigned from our board UNTIL the schools had committed to giving him games.

Here's my question, 1st of all, I believe we should be a brotherhood, we should support and raise one another up. How would you handle this situation? Some of our members want to work both boards. ( BTW, we have about 2500 assignments and his board took about 100 )

If one of our members works for his board ( at this point we know of 2) Should there be a penalty? What type of penalty?

Does this happen in other areas? We have a contract with the area schools and conference, we were to be the EXCLUSIVE provider of officiating services for basketball. They interpret the contract differently ( NOW) We serve about 13 high schools, 3 of them have given us all the conference games, not the non conference games, 1 school gave the other board ALL their schedule ( 15 games ) because he offered to work 2 person instead of 3 person, the remainder of schools have given us their entire schedule.

I'd like to stay positive, but this guy.....sore loser. Rat.

If it were truly an exclusive contract, you could seek a judicial review. He could have be seen as interfering with a contractual relationship. But is it worth it? Here’s the deal, officials are independent contractors in most areas. We do know some of The practicalities but....

If someone wants to work under two assigner umbrellas so what? You can assign whoever you want but are you now interfering with some contractual relationship? Honestly I’d let it go, work hard... show them who has the quality officials and why....

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Camron Rust

You're making some assumptions. Your context implied that being college gave the officials a choice of who to work for. Just being college doesn't make that true when the conferences hire the same assignor.

Never did I make any assumptions. My point was that it can prevent the perceived or actual conflicts of interest.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Never did I make any assumptions. My point was that it can prevent the perceived or actual conflicts of interest.

I guess I just don't get your point. Can you elaborate?

[Nevadaref]

Originally Posted by SC Official

Never did I make any assumptions. My point was that it can prevent the perceived or actual conflicts of interest.

What Camron is saying is that the problem persists at the college level too because several conferences will use the same assignor. For example, if the MWC, PAC-12, WCC, and Big12 all use the same assignor and his pool of officials, then you are in the same situation as a single HS association.

[RefCT]

Originally Posted by BillyMac

And except for those grandfathered in, one can only work in the county where one resides, so unlike Bonnie and Clyde often did, we can't cross county lines.

Reread the policy Bill. They recently changed it to accepting duals if they only accept assignments from our board. Probably to get around the lawsuit findings regarding independent consultant status.



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[BillyMac]

Originally Posted by RefCT

Reread the policy Bill. They recently changed it to accepting duals if they only accept assignments from our board. Probably to get around the lawsuit findings regarding independent consultant status.

Our local board Dual Member Policy (dated March, 2018) is worded as RefCT states above, however, our most recent (Fall, 2018) local board recruit application specifically states that the applicant must reside in our little corner of Connecticut. Maybe once one becomes a member, one can move around. Dual membership has always been a mystery to me. RefCT sounds like he knows what he's talking about and knows much more about it than me. Does a dual member have to pay dues to both his parent board and his assigning board?

Like Bonnie and Clyde, maybe we can cross county lines.

[SC Official]

Originally Posted by Camron Rust

I guess I just don't get your point. Can you elaborate?

Originally Posted by Nevadaref

What Camron is saying is that the problem persists at the college level too because several conferences will use the same assignor. For example, if the MWC, PAC-12, WCC, and Big12 all use the same assignor and his pool of officials, then you are in the same situation as a single HS association.

Makes sense. Poor wording choice by me.

[Raymond]

Originally Posted by Nevadaref

What Camron is saying is that the problem persists at the college level too because several conferences will use the same assignor. For example, if the MWC, PAC-12, WCC, and Big12 all use the same assignor and his pool of officials, then you are in the same situation as a single HS association.

On this side of the country, an assignor may have multiple conferences, but it doesn't mean an official will work or sign a contract for all those conferences. Regardless of how many conferences a supervisor has, most college officials work for multiple supervisors.