There have been some comments about this in another thread, but I thought it deserved it's own discussion. In some associations, apparently, the officials "kick back" a fee or a percentage to the assignor.

In my area, the HS assignor is hired by the ADs. The assignor is paid one game fee for each team's schedule that he assigns. (My assignor is male, so I'll keep using "he"; no slight intended.) So he gets $64 for assigning all the officials to ABC High's Boys Varsity games for the entire season. He gets another $64 from ABC High for assigning officials to their Girls Varsity games for the entire season. Likewise, he gets $64 each for assigning officials to XYZ High's Boys and Girls Varsity games. He gets $42 for each JV and Freshman schedule he completes. So he receives $296 from each school that he assigns. The officials pay no assigning fee.

My question is twofold: how common is it for HS officials to pay a fee for receiving assignments? and if you pay a fee to get your assignments, who chooses the assignor?

I feel like, if every person in my association is going to pay the person, then my association better have a say in who that person is.

Any thoughts?

Chuck

Our association works with the conferences in the area. Each conference gives an association all of there games. Our area has 3-4 main associations and they do trade games among themselves, especially if one group doesn't have enough quality people to fill all assingments for a particular night. The assignor is paid by the association through our dues each year. I'm not exactly sure how much we pay him but it's worth it. With 125 officials he has a lot to do. We actually have two assignors. One does less than varstiy games and the other does just varsity, at least until the week of the game. Our dues are $25 a year.

In Utah, we pay dues to the Utah High School Activities Assoc. and each area (SL, Ogden, Provo, Southern Utah) has their own association that also receives dues from each official. I believe that the assigner is employed by the UHSAA since he assigns all Varsity sports.
We've had the same assigner for about 7-8 years now.

For SL County games, (rec ball) we pay a local "association" and since we don't have any formal training programs and aren't given rule books or materials,
it basically goes to the assigner. Probably around 2 grand or so per year. Not much actually for all the headaches.

Assignors Work for Each League
 

In SW Ohio, our assignors work for a league's AD's. Most assignors have both the boys and girls schedules, and most do it for both varsity and junior varsity. Ten teams in a league, ten home games, two games per home date (five officials per date), both boys and girls... 1000 games/year for one league. And most assignors around here assign for two-three different leagues. Don't know what they get paid, but it's not enough. The association that each official is a member of doesn't have anything to do with the assignors.

Chuck,

We pay our assignor on our board as well... It is a percentage of your game fees....

Our assignor is elected to the board just like the other positions...

Assignment Fees
 

In our HS association we pay no fee to any assignor. The HS Conference that governs our section assigns the games and the leagues pay them to do so. The independent and Catholic leagues are assigned by an independent agent and again they pay them a fee to do so.

In Northern Nevada we pay a percentage per assignment. This goes to the association to go to the assigner. Now this year we had assignment by committee (board members, not just one assigner)and I am not sure who got the money.

I don't do basketball here in Northern Virginia but I do football, FP and SP softball, however, I believe that the local BB groups operate under simular conditions.

For FB (rec leagues to HS) each official pays dues to the association. The amount includes what the local charges plus what the state charges plus the insurance that the state provides. For each game assigned the Commissioner(assignor) assigns to an official a fee (10%) is deducted. II can't remember if he gets all of it or a part of it). Thus for a 5 man varsity crew plus timer ($65/man plus $30 timer) would be $35.50. He also recieves a one time booking fee from each school/league to assign the games, I don't know if this is a flat fee or a percentage of the contract. He also gets any fines assessed the school/league for cancellation without proper advanced notice (stipulation of the contract). Each official will get up to a full game fee also for such cancellations. The secterary/treasurer is also paid a flat fee for his services. These offices, and others that comprise the board of directors, are elected by the general membership.

For HS FP (rec leagues to HS) the situation is the same although I don't know all the particulars. Each official has a 10% fee deducted from each game fee. Unfortunately for this association, these "officiers" are not elected by the general membership (a bone of contention for some members). This group also assesses dues but here it gets a little complicated. The association has its local dues, the state (VHSL) assesses each official a fee per sport but asseses the insurance on a yearly basis (school year July to July). I paid my insurance through the football association. So for me my dues to the softball group would be the local assessment plus the state assessment for FP only. (This association also does baseball and basketball. I only officiate FP).

For SP this is my first year in this organization so I'm not sure how everythigs works.

Montana
 

We have the regular MHSA (state) dues you pay to keep your rating (license), each local pool (assn.) may charge their own dues as well. The pools contract with the schools to provide officials. The schools consider this a privilege to the pools and the schedules come and go according to each school's mood at the time of contracting (which promotes politics).

In our particular pool, the president is also the chairman of the assignment committee, and does most of the work. The committee meets to go over the schedule and make any corrections they see fit prior to the season. The pool dues are paid to the chairman to offset phone calls (mostly). There are no other costs to the officials, or pay to the assigner. Dues for basketball are $20 per year. Assignments are given to the officials two weeks in advance, and changes are made to the "master" schedule as the need arises.

We meet every Monday evening where we hold our "study club", make final confirmation of that week's games and provide the next week's games to the officials. Until this past season the girls played in the fall and boys in the winter, so we went through this routine for 6 months (if you do only basketball).

[Edited by Blackhawk357 on Apr 1st, 2003 at 09:52 AM]

Upstate NY - High school

Varsity Game fee + $5
JV Game fee + $5

Assignor Elected
Reassignor Elected

Assignments are accepted by Oct. 15th
Any officials that turn back assignments after this date are charged a $5 reassignment fee for each game.

Div. III

Dues based on the number of games assigned

01-10 games $50
11-15 games $75 examples only
16-20 games $100

In our LA unit
 

The assignor is an elected Board member. He assigns for all public (and nearly all private) high schools in our area.

At the end of one of our late November unit meetings we received our schedule for the entire year. We had that evening to review it and accept/decline all games. If we declined there was no change fee. If we accepted, we had to pay a $3 fee per game that night. I believe we had about 1,900 games in our unit. I think the assignor's job is difficult and full of politics and possibly hurt feelings.

During the season a few games were cancelled, a few added, etc. and we settle up with the assignor once the season is over.

In Portland, our association "elects" a commissioner who assigns all games that are played under OSAA. 92 schools, 6800 games, 350 refs. The association takes the money the schools pay (some organization of schools sets the fees) and keeps some for association expenses, pays some (on a per game basis) to the commissioner, some to the treasurer (he EARNS it managing half a million dollars a year) and then sets the rates to pay officials. In effect, the pay for the commissioner comes out of the per game fee the schools pay.

It's definitely better to have the assignor paid and chosen by the refs. It's also our privilege to have a commissioner who coaches respect and appreciate. We get the best of both worlds.

You're absolutely right about Howard. I hope those who come to the NASO conference in June make sure they attend his seminar.

BTW - I notice you didn't mention that I take absolutely no fees for assigning all the games in my rec league, so you get your full pay. Oh wait - you do the same in the upcoming spring league. Don't forget to let me choose my own schedule, old buddy, old pal.

Actually, Mark, ahem, ... well, I am getting paid for the spring league. But I thought you got something from TBA. Do I now change my opinion of you to Mensch, or Chump?

In Houston the varsity assigner makes in the neighborhood of $20K per year. We pay $2 per game that we work to the assigner. This goes for both the initial assignemt of the games and any subsequent reassignment for the game. There are more games to take care of than any sane person would ever want to deal with. The phone at this house rings nonstop.

Officials who work a 50+ game season will pay over $100 in assigning fees, plus our state and local dues. The subvarsity assigners get $1.25 per game per official.

Depends on which day of the week it is, right??

Anyway, here we have an assignor who is contracted by our elected board...he is paid a small fee by each school, and a percentage of the game fees we earn (I think it's 5%)...he earns it! He is allowed to hire an assistant assignor and pay whatever he chooses out of his salary (or pocket)...he assigns all HS, Middle School, rec league, city league, and whatever else our association officiates...he is very busy...he earns what he gets...he is also very well respected by coaches, AD's, and officials, so it's a great situation. i have never really heard anyone complain about how much he gets...

Independent.
 

In my area, assignors are almost totally independent. Some might have a slight affiliation to an association, but in order for them to function, they need to hire officials outside of their "main" association.

And in many parts of our state, we do not have any assignors at all. So for many associations, this is not even an issue.

Peace

Juulie - I thought you were getting paid for the camp and you were just assigning on top of that. Anyway, congratulations.

No, I don't get anything for assigning for TBA. As you know, it's a non-profit and I've been a volunteer on the Board for 14 years. My only perk is that I can make out my own schedule. As you know, that's worth something. I always choose my own partners based on attitude, personality and sense of humor.

It's not all that time consuming anyway. Remember, I also make out the game schedule for the league so I can pretty much do what I want. Actually, it's harder making out the training schedule than the game schedule.

When will you have spring league info?

Gasp! You don't worry about "presence"? :D

I think they get better games if they kickback good presents.

The less of it they have, the more games they get. I give the most games to the refs who score the highest on the rules test, and who will eat the least at the season-ending pizza party.

The association that I used to belong, They paid the assignor a set fee at the begininning of the year, and it was voted upon by the association. The next year they raised the assignors fee. The asssignor has been in his position for many years. The first year I belonged to the association I felt like, they are paying that guy a lot of money to assign games and why should he get all that extra money. After a year I felt he was underpaid. I guess my point is, the schools and other leagues sign a contract with our association and the fees are paid by the party signing the contract with the association.

AK ref SE

Which explains my schedule with the TBA...

Dave in Vancouver, and Howard in Portland. Do you suppose it's something in the water?

My association in Northern VA has contracts with most of the schools in the area (about 75 I believe). We have 2 commissioners who do the assigning -- 1 for rec and 1 for HS. The HS guy has an assistant who handles a lot of the F/JV stuff, particularly turn-backs for F/JV games. I believe we "can" be fined $25 if we turn back a game on the day of the game -- depending on the reason. The 2 main commissioners are paid 10% of our earning and the HS assignor splits his (somehow) with his assistant. The commissioners, like the rest of our board members are elected by the members -- usually for a 2 year term. In fact, we just closed the application process for the HS spot about a week ago. We had 1 applicant for the position and he is the incumbent. No one else really wanted to take on the job -- I know I wouldn't. We do not contract any games on our own. I think the guys really earn their 10% and quite frankly, I don't know how their spouses put up with the time they have to put into the schedules. We have some really top notch guys doing the assigning.

Well where I work, there are two assignors. The main assignor get 11% commission on all games. At least that is how it was put to me. Out of that, he hires an assistant to assign rec ball leagues and there are quite a bit. I did 200+ games including fed. Some officials make $6-10,000 a year. Last year, executive director told me they billed over $900,000 bucaroos. He works his tail off to cover games even answering the phone till 1:00 am. He has done it for quite a few years they tell me.

Ronald,
In bd. 12 your assignor is Joe Marosy. He is elected every two years. He does not officiate any of the games. He only assigns them. He has been the commissioner for more than 20 years. He handles all of the scholastic games for the entire association. He hires an assistant who handles all the rec ball. Each member pays 11% of their gross in assignor fees. This is in addition to your association dues ($55 approx.) and an activities fee (about $40) plus a $25 fee for MD registration. Joe takes 8% and gives his assistant 3%. His total for the year comes out to something like $75,000, and the board also pays his phone bill. I believe that he is retired now from his regular job, but he used to be the AD at Blair HS. I only mention this to make the point that assigning HS basketball was not his full-time job.
Just FYI in my last year with bd 12 I paid over $600 in fees.

I have been told that we do about $800K a year. Wish that was my salary!:D

WOW, I can't believe that some of you have to actually pay a fee to work a game!!

In Wisconsin, each conference has a commissioner that assigns the varsity games. Schools are then responsible for assigning the JV/Frosh games. Our association does the lower level assigning for the schools in our area but we don't charge a fee per game. In fact, the person who does this does not get paid (I had scheduled the past 3 years). On average, we assign about 400 games a season.

The only fees we pay are the membership fees for our State and Local associations.

The Varsity assignor in our chapter gets a flat salary of $3k that comes out of our "chapter dues" to the state. I myself am a high volume subchapter assignor for all the subvarsity stuff in my area, (to the tune of over 900 games a season) so I divide my invoices up among the schools by charging them $1 per game assigned. That way the smaller vendors pay a different amount than the larger vendors do.

And we wonder why officials are quitting in droves. http://www.stopstart.freeserve.co.uk/smilie/jump.gif