Interesting Article in San Angelo Paper about officials

[CenTexZebra]

http://www.gosanangelo.com/sports/high-school/officials-shortage-critical-in-west-texas_70989789

[NorCalMike]

Although not as severe as the shortage in West Texas, we are having similar issues in Sacramento. This Friday night we have more games than officials. Some of the low level games are going to only get 4 man crews.

[Etref]

East Texas much the same, even more severe on Thursday for sub varsity

[TexDoc]

We are starting to see problems in San Antonio.  We really are struggling to cover sub varsity games.  Seems like the coaches are getting worse as well.  This is going to be an interesting avocation in a few years.  Maybe they start getting dads to call ms games.  I'd pay to see that.

[JasonTX]

We are starting to see problems in San Antonio.  We really are struggling to cover sub varsity games.  Seems like the coaches are getting worse as well.  This is going to be an interesting avocation in a few years.  Maybe they start getting dads to call ms games.  I'd pay to see that.

We had some of our districts that used to play Games A, B, and C at one location, but now they decided to play Games A and B at one site and then game C at the other.  We'd knock out the triple header with 1 crew, but now we have to come up with 2 crews to cover both sites.

[rickref]

We had some of our districts that used to play Games A, B, and C at one location, but now they decided to play Games A and B at one site and then game C at the other.  We'd knock out the triple header with 1 crew, but now we have to come up with 2 crews to cover both sites.

We had some schools at one time run all three at one site and it helped. But they are doing the same here and splitting them up. It does not help for sub varsity coverage when they split sites. We have a Friday coming up where we are short and had another already. Some schools trying running Saturday morning but a lot of guys don't want to get up and do that after they have worked a Friday night late.

Good article thanks for sharing CenTex.

[Coby]

Very well written article.  I think they hit the nail on the head.  It is good to see that other people see the problem for what it is.  Houston is having problems filling as well.  One of our unique problems is people are paying their membership fees so they can get their TASO card and call peewee games on Saturday.  They have no intention of ever calling subvarsity but they need their membership card to get the sweet peewee games.  It is literally 200 people that do this.

[DallasLJ]

Very well written article.  I think they hit the nail on the head.  It is good to see that other people see the problem for what it is.  Houston is having problems filling as well.  One of our unique problems is people are paying their membership fees so they can get their TASO card and call peewee games on Saturday.  They have no intention of ever calling subvarsity but they need their membership card to get the sweet peewee games.  It is literally 200 people that do this.

  Sounds like you need to amend your by-laws to require all officials to work a minimum number of SV games in order to maintain membership in good standing.  That would mean senior guys have to work a minimum number as well.

[Wingmanbp]

Fort Worth Chapter has a minimum of 16 subvarsity games. Not much but it does help them get covered.
We have a shortage at the sites away from the metroplex. Covering most games with just 2-3 officials where it should be 3-4. I have done several 5A JV games with a 3 man crew.

[TexDoc]

Fort Worth Chapter has a minimum of 16 subvarsity games. Not much but it does help them get covered.
We have a shortage at the sites away from the metroplex. Covering most games with just 2-3 officials where it should be 3-4. I have done several 5A JV games with a 3 man crew.

That's more than our sv minimum.  We are each required to cover 5 sv game sites on Thursdays, that's it.  We usually get all of the other days covered but it is getting tight on those days as well. 

[Coby]

Currently I can give 1 night a week to officiating in the Fall.  I dont take more then 1 varsity game and I dont call subvarsity.  Before children I called 80-100 subvarsity games a season.  When the kids are more self reliant I may pick up more sub varsity.  When I retire I will do a lot of subvarsity. 

How many 30-45 year olds do you have in chapters with subvarsity requirements?  It is hard at this point in time to justify extra time away from job and family.  I also think it is weak sauce to require people to work.  Hey lets not fix any of the other variables that lead to a lack of officials ( pay, working conditions, lack of recruiting, etc etc) and lets just add another burden to our membership.

Monte would you quit if you had to work subvarsity?  I know I would and I think there are easily 6-8 other 30-45 year olds on crews that would quit as well if they have to give up any more family time.

[DallasLJ]

Coby

  I have a problem with that.  Although my son is now a senior in HS, I have always (20+ years) made time for SV.  In Dallas, every official has to work a minimum of 5 dates.  If a chapter is having problems covering games,  are ALL the Division 1's working?  Or have some of them decided that "they have put in their time"?  I think every official can find 5 days out of 11 weeks to cover SV games.  Doesn't have to be a Thursday.  Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday need officials too.  Can't all be gravy.  Everyone has to help with the heavy lifting. If you chapter has no problem covering games because you have a surplus of officials, then great -- no problem.  But that is not the situation in most Chapters.

[Welpe]

Currently I can give 1 night a week to officiating in the Fall.  I dont take more then 1 varsity game and I dont call subvarsity.  Before children I called 80-100 subvarsity games a season.  When the kids are more self reliant I may pick up more sub varsity.  When I retire I will do a lot of subvarsity. 

How many 30-45 year olds do you have in chapters with subvarsity requirements?  It is hard at this point in time to justify extra time away from job and family.  I also think it is weak sauce to require people to work.  Hey lets not fix any of the other variables that lead to a lack of officials ( pay, working conditions, lack of recruiting, etc etc) and lets just add another burden to our membership.

Monte would you quit if you had to work subvarsity?  I know I would and I think there are easily 6-8 other 30-45 year olds on crews that would quit as well if they have to give up any more family time.

I still work a little subvarsity but I limited myself to Thursday nights this year and I try my hardest to work only single games on Thursday. You hit it Coby, with two young children at home I don't want to be gone from them more than I have to be. Between Thursday and Friday night, and work requiring me to travel sometimes, I'm gone from them quite enough.

A minimum of sixteen subvarsity games a season plus a varsity schedule would be too much for me.

[Coby]

DLJ,

I get the argument for SV requirements.  Really I do.  I just think that requiring  everyone to work SV is going to have zero solvency on the bigger problem.  Look at it this way... are chapters that have SV requirements still facing shortages?  Then this policy has zero solvency.  TASO chapters use it as a quick fix instead of a proper fix.  Talking about any of the other issues seem to be off of the board but throwing this additional burden on members seems like it is always the most popular first choice. 

My family situation is I have 15 days to call football.  2 scrimmages, 11 games, and maybe 2 playoff games.  That is it.

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Given away about 80 million in scholastic aid over last 6 years

[Wingmanbp]

The thing about our requirements is that its 16 games and not a certain amount of days so you can rack up 16 games in 4 dates if you want to. Most people don't but for me up until this year I worked 3-4 days a week. This year I am only working one extra day a week besides my varsity schedule because I have a full time job and just started a part time business so I need those other dates to work my business.
Yes with the requirements we still have shortages but without them there would be games with no officials

[DallasLJ]

Not just a shortage issue. One of the reason we do it in Dallas is to make sure the Crew Chiefs get a chance to see other officials since we change our crews every two years up here.  Very helpful for the young officials to get exposed to senior officials to both learn and have a chance to get on a crew.

[TXMike]

In Coby's defense..not that he needs it, but he gives a lot more of his time to this than many guys who are working subvarsity every week.  The stuff he does with HUDL for his Chapter and others is invaluable.  Just don't want folks thinking he is sitting around doing nothing while  others are busting their arses.

[Wingmanbp]

The way I looked at it when I started was I needed to work as many games as I physically could to help cover the costs of start up. lol I worked 72 games that first season, all subvarsity. I was working some weeks Monday thru Saturday. But you do that every year and you will be burnt out in a hurry.

[Etref]

I have been calling for 28 years in three different chapters. Every year I have called we had the same problem with covering SV games. But now it is acute! We used to have 3-4 games sets depending on classification (7/8JV or 7/8AB). I have worked a many three games sets (hate the ) but that is what we must have the schools do in order to fill the games.

There is still the problem of some who abuse the system and find reasons to not work any sub varsity games

[Welpe]

One of the things that we are running into is that some districts have taken their double headers and split them off into two sites on the same day at the same time. There are other districts that are playing their Jr High on Thursdays at the site opposite of the Fr-JV games. This effectively doubles the amount of officials required to cover the games of two teams. Between that and I believe going to the metro mileage plan, we

As a chapter I'm hoping this is something we can address with the districts. It won't solve the issue all together but it will help I believe.

[Coby]

What has happened is the Jr Hi principals in their infinite wisdom has decided that having their 13 year olds out until 9:00 at night on a school night is having a negative effect on their educational prowess.  So if we only have 1 game at 4:30 little Johnny gets home at 7:00 and can still do his homework.  Completely ignoring logistics of having a game administrator at 2 different dates, officials, transportation costs, lights, and the increase in transportation costs.  High School coaches dont like it either.  They preferred only having to send a coach to oversee the game once a week not twice a week.

[NorCalMike]

I think you guys in Texas have been dealing with lots of mid week games for a while. In my area California, traditionally, Freshman football was Thursday, JV/Varsity (2 games) Friday night, youth and the few schools that don't have lighted field on Saturday. This worked pretty good since most of the Freshman games on Thursday started after 5:30 and most of us that work during the day could make it to the field on time.

Recently, several leagues started play Varsity only of Friday nights and moving junior varsity to Thursday so that we have two games Thursday with the first starting at 4 PM. This has made it much tougher to cover these games, especially in the outlying areas. The schools did this without ever talking to the officials about it. The reason for the change is they believe they will make more money on the gate this way. This doesn't matter to us because we are paid a flat rate.

[Etref]

What has happened is the Jr Hi principals in their infinite wisdom has decided that having their 13 year olds out until 9:00 at night on a school night is having a negative effect on their educational prowess.  So if we only have 1 game at 4:30 little Johnny gets home at 7:00 and can still do his homework.  Completely ignoring logistics of having a game administrator at 2 different dates, officials, transportation costs, lights, and the increase in transportation costs.  High School coaches dont like it either.  They preferred only having to send a coach to oversee the game once a week not twice a week.

Take two buses, let the 7/8 play and go home then the JV can play

[TexDoc]

I think you guys in Texas have been dealing with lots of mid week games for a while. In my area California, traditionally, Freshman football was Thursday, JV/Varsity (2 games) Friday night, youth and the few schools that don't have lighted field on Saturday. This worked pretty good since most of the Freshman games on Thursday started after 5:30 and most of us that work during the day could make it to the field on time.

Recently, several leagues started play Varsity only of Friday nights and moving junior varsity to Thursday so that we have two games Thursday with the first starting at 4 PM. This has made it much tougher to cover these games, especially in the outlying areas. The schools did this without ever talking to the officials about it. The reason for the change is they believe they will make more money on the gate this way. This doesn't matter to us because we are paid a flat rate.

It would be sacrilege to have a JV game before the varsity game in Texas.  And, I sure don't want to work a JV game at 4:30 or 5 the last weekend of August or first few weeks of September when field temps are around 120 degrees, then work a varsity game.  JV games will always be on another day. 

One other issue we have in Texas is the shear number of players playing football.  It is not uncommon for a middle schools to have 3 teams per grade, 7th and 8th, and sometimes even freshmen.  There are even sophomore teams at some schools.  I've seen a high school field as many as 6 or 7 teams early in the season, and then they want to run games simultaneously. 

Requiring guys to work is good, to a degree, but we cannot all work every Thursday, and most of us cannot work more than one SV day and varsity day in the same week.  We also have some varsity games on Thursday, taking those guys out of the mix.  In fact, we have a policy that does not allow any official to call a SV game the same day as a varsity game, even if they work Saturday morning then Saturday night varsity.

It is simple supply and demand.  There is too much demand and not enough young, willing and able supply.  Personally, I've been working two sv days a week for the most part and one varsity each week with a few double varsity games a week thrown in there.  I'm barely hanging in there working that much and I'm ready to cut down to one sv day a week.  The knees just can't take much more.  The question then becomes, do guys that cannot work three days a week hang it up or just hang in there and work what they can?

[Joe Stack]

I'm not saying money is the only reason for these sorts of problems, but if subvarsity games paid $50 each, plus mileage, we wouldn't have as big a problem. A lot of guys, me included, don't like to work 3 man crews, even for jr. high. I don't mind it for 7th grade or even 8th grade B, but I've seen some pretty good 8th grade A teams and working 3 man is difficult at best. In areas that can work it, I think we should start using 4 in all jr. high games and at least 5 in all high school games. I think that would bring some more guys out and would give us the ability to train guys like umpires and back judges better. Some guys only have the ability to work those positions once or twice every 2 weeks.

However, in the non-urban areas, I know the increased crew size isn't going to work. I don't know what the fee increase would do.