Houston had some 79 crews in 2014. I would say that it would now be a fairly safe bet that its number of crews will go down somewhere between the very high 60's and low 70's, at least for the 2015 football season. As I understand it, with all Houston crews now being designated as 7-Man Crews, whenever the 5-Man Mechanics games, irregardless of classification, are picked in Sessions 2 and 3, the F and S can be designated for game clock and shot clock duty in those games, or can be relegated to the assignment pool with all other officials that did not draw a game on a particular date.
I can also see that some of the 6A/5A coaches that were adverse to the usage of 7-Man Mechanics, might well now have second thoughts regarding using those mechanics, if for no other reason at all, in being able to have access to selecting the crews that they have been using in the past. If they wait until Session 2, then those same crews are more than likely not going to be up on the board for selection.
I do not know exactly what the breakdown of schools or districts were in the acceptance of 7-Man, but with all of the high octane, no-huddle, spread offenses that are currently being run, and the added responsibilities of maintaining visual jurisdiction of both the visual game and play clocks, 7-Man Mechanics is about the only logical format to try to collectively cover these with.
This greatly reminds me of back in the late 80's/early 90's when college basketball introduced 3-Man Mechanics, primarily with all of the run-and-shoot offenses, coupled with the relentless full-court-presses. Surely enough, the high schools started to mirror those very same college coaching tactics and it was largely the college basketball officials who also worked the high school game that suggested this new format to those high school coaches and administrators..
Well, of course the high school coaches didn't really want it because it just presented another set of eyes out there to potentially call a lot more fouls to get their star players out of the game early; the administrators didn't want it because it would mean requesting a lot more money for their already strapped budgets in order to them to financially function; and the old school 2-Man officials didn't want to see it happen because they were quite comfortable enough doing the rigorous Two-Man, and did not want to dedicate the necessary time and energy in order to learn how to effectively work 3-Man. They were very happy right where they were, often muttering the old addage, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
Well, as Houston gradually took the initiative and got it all started, first in the larger schools, and then rapidly into all of the other ones, inclusive of even the smaller parochials; little by little, the vast majority of the remaining state chapters of TASO came to adopt it almost universally.
The coaches ended up liking it because they could see that this new set of mechanics fostered a better covered and safely played game. The administators liked it because of not only those same reasons, but also of the fact that the usage of a third official, conversely, did not break their budget. The majority of old school officials who wanted to keep 2-Man the norm, learned and greatly succeeded in these new mechanics, while the extremely small minority of the stubborn, obstinate, politicizing ones pulled up stakes and retired. The really great thing about 3-Man was that it preemptively added years to the officiating livlihoods of so many of the officials, because it helped curtail a lot of the constant running that a two-man crew does. Just as with basketball, the new football mechanics should theoretically do the very same for that sport.
Houston is the true trailblazer in getting 7-Man Football Mechanics into the forefront. As it succeeded with bringing us from 4-Man to 5-Man Football Officiating, it will also succeed with making 7-Man Mechanics the new norm, first for Houston, and then for the State. As with all new things, it's going to take a lot of work, dedication, recruitment of high school and college prospects, and training to make this all properly function. But with TASO's and the UIL's tacit acceptance of this necessity, I know that all of us can do our parts in making it all work effectively!
