The time to bring that up would have been at the start of the year, or whenever the agreement which covers this year was reached, not now. JMO

If the principals revisit the pay raise and vote it down again, it will just start all over.

And no official in LA will ever gain a decent and fair game fee imo, let alone health insurance and a company car, as long as there's other persons salivating in the wings just waiting to grab games from them at $36 a pop.

That's not completely true. If those people in the wing can't call anywhere near as good of a game, the schools will realize they are getting what they are paying for and will pay for better officials. On the other hand, if there's no drop in the quality of officiating, it won't matter at all.

Better Than Nothing ...
 

This season, we got a 2% raise.

THERE IS NO CONTRACT! We have the same system here as they do in LA. The officials association and the member schools are part of the state association. There is no contract between the schools, the officals or the association. It's simply in the bylaws of the state association that certified local associations will train and provide officials and are assigned to specific schools. Member schools will only use state certified officials. That's it, the end of it.

And if they choose not to work they can certainly do so. You can call it a strike, wlakout or whatever, but they certainly have the standing to do it. They are independent contractors. They work at their own pleasure and the pleasure of the schools. Schools must use LHSAA officials...at least until the emergency measure this week.

And it should. But hopefully the revisitation and ensuing debate will occur at the proper time.

Salivating in the wings is hardly an accurate description.

I don't think that we can necessarily say that this is the wrong timing. This is when the annucal convention is scheduled. We have no idea what may have occurred in previous conventions.

Once a game is assigned and accepted, I think there's a contract (but IANAL), even if there's no written document entitled "Contract."

So, it's unclear to me whether they are (or were) not working games that they had previously accpeted, or if they just weren't taking any new games.

Burke's Law ...
 

Connecticut is an all IAABO state. All of our public high school, and Catholic high school, assigners are hired by the local IAABO boards. It is my understanding that the state board (overseeing all the local boards) signs a contract with the state interscholastic sports governing body every year.

For the past several years we have been having problems getting paid by the high schools in one of our largest cities. The excuse was always that the schools send the paperwork the Board of Education office, who then sends the paperwork to city hall, who then cuts the checks. The paperwork was always getting lost during this journey. It got really ridiculous two seasons ago, I finally got paid on July 14 for a game that I did before Christmas. I got paid because I was persistent, several phone calls, which always switched over to voice mail, and several emails, all of which were never responded to. I finally got my assignment commissioner, and secretary treasurer, involved, and that's how I finally got paid. Many probably never got paid, especially those who didn't keep accurate records, those that just go out to their mailbox, open up a check, and go to the bank to cash it. Others just gave up.

At several local board meetings we all complained that we needed to get their attention with some type of job action, like not working any more of their games. We were told that we couldn't because that would have been a breach of contract.

If next year's pay raise is voted down, and this is unacceptable, fine, just say "Good luck finding officials next year." Walking out at this point was not the thing to do, in my opinion.

Also, some say that the threat of the walkout is what caused some principals to vote against the pay raise who had previously intended to vote for it, before they heard this threat. Is this true, and how do these principals feel now? Who knows.

There is competition between associations. A couple of schools near my home told my assignor that if we would cover them through this, we would be rewarded with their business next season. The crossover turns out not to be necessary but I'm hopeful the switch, which had already been discussed, will still take place.

It's a completely internal situation, with schools and officials both being part of the state association. It's like a dispute between Coke and Coke Zero.

As an LA official said earlier, associations are assigned to specific schools, that's pretty much the extent of a "contract." All I have to do is turn the game back in and I don't have to work it. If no one else is willing to work it, then the booking agent informs the school he doesn't have officials for the game.

At this point, it looks like they may have reached an agreement for most associations to go back to work.

LHSAA holds emergency meeting

Lowballing ...
 

We have this with spring, summer, and fall, AAU tournaments. There are a lot of "mini assigners" out there who only assign AAU tournaments, and each have their own little group of officials who work for them. AAU tournament organizers were trying to get the lowest fees possible by pitting the "mini assigners" against each other.

Our state IAABO board tried to get this all under the IAABO "umbrella", that is coming up with a standard fees statewide, and only allowing IAABO certified officials to work AAU games if the games were under this IAABO "umbrella". We made some headway, but not much due to the fact that officials are viewed as independent contractors, and some officials, and some AAU organizers, threatened to sue based on unfair labor practices, like restraint of trade. This scared our state IAABO board, so they backed off, and tabled it for another time.

Wow!

Nowayinhell can you call something like that "competition". That's nothing but freaking backstabbing. No wonder you guys are only getting $36/game if something like that is fairly prevalant. You're just screwing each other and in the end you're all paying for doing so.

No wonder the LHSAA has been getting away with underpaying for so many years.

I've seen this in other states. Associations poach schools from other associations. Miserable practice. I much prefer working as a true independent contractor and working whatever schools I want to work.

It's backstabbing to hire the people who would work when others wouldn't?
This was the principal's suggestion, not the assignors. Schools switch from one association to the other all the time. This is not due to being solicited, nor promised anything. (as far as I know) What I hear when a school switches is not that they switched because they like the new group, but that they disliked the old.

Question: Which officials do you like least/hate most?

Most common answer: The ones that called the last game we lost.