This bill will accomplish what has been desperately needed for many years - a clear seaparation between the UIL and officials. However, it still doesn't solve the issue of assignment of officials. In fact, as written, it can throw the assignment process wide open - not a good thing. Schools/coaches will still have the ability to hire anyone they want, for whatever compensation to which they both agree. At best, unqualified or egotistical individuals can offer cut-rate services to secure assignments. At worst, unscrupulous individuals can offer and provide "favorable" officiating to employers to get assignments and/or greater compensation.
If this bill passes as is, TASO's best hope is to put its best foot forward and show that its members are, and always will be, better trained and more competent than those unaffiliated, and that TASO is willing to work with the UIL to establish a fair, reasonable, and consistent compensation package for its membership, state-wide. Schools/coaches must not be part of the official selection process, or TASO will be right back to where they were before all this started. TASO must insist that they be solely responsible for assigning its officials to contests, without input or influence from the schools. TASO must offer the UIL a state-wide assignment policy that allows for some level of 'refusal' by teams (i.e., a limited 'scratch' policy), as well as defines how officials will be assigned to contests. TASO must offer a methodology by which teams can have a game(s)/individual play(s) reviewed by a small multi-partisan committee (TASO/UIL/Independent third party) to resolve complaints, with an established plan for accountability by both sides (although the outcome of a 'final' score can never be changed).
This is, essentially, how it works for virtually all other levels of sports. The NCAA conferences, the AFL, the NFL, etc., each have a director/coordinator of officiating that maintains a staff of officials, has sole authority and responsibility for making assignments to contests, and has sole authority and responsibility for the quality of the officiating that is presented. The coordinator is responsible only to a "commissioner," never to the competitors. In this case, TASO would be the coordinator, and the UIL would be the commissioner (of sorts). If the UIL believed it could get superior officiating by working with another group, they would be free to 'fire' TASO, and go elsewhere, just as a commissioner can 'fire' a coordinator.
TASO's ability to maintain a staff of sufficient size and quality to fulfill all UIL assignments (all levels) would be its primary asset. But that asset would have to be maintained at a minimum performance level, or, just as in the business world, that asset becomes a liabilty and would be replaced.
Fair enough. Let's give it a try.
