Sports
body has month to devise reform plan
Wednesday, July 20, 2005 • By
TERRENCE DOPP • The
Express-Times
TRENTON -- Responding to months of
scandal, Commissioner of Education William Librera on
Tuesday took aim at the embattled New Jersey State
Interscholastic Athletic Association.
Librera gave NJSIAA officials a month to
outline plans to lower ticket prices, craft a comprehensive
travel policy, reduce a $2 million operating surplus and
correct its policy of keeping playoff revenues.
The NJSIAA, the governing body overseeing
31 high school sports in the Garden State, is funded
primarily by ticket sales at post-season sporting events and
dues paid by the 433 public, private and parochial schools
taking part in football, wrestling, track and boys
basketball.
"Change is necessary" at the NJSIAA,
Librera said in the letter to NJSIAA Executive Director Boyd
Sands. "As much as I believe that the overall conclusions
that are negative are not warranted, I do believe that
significant change is warranted in several
areas."
Librera's spokeswoman, Kathryn Forsyth,
declined to comment further.
Officials with the sports agency have
until Aug. 19 to report back to the Department of Education
with a reform plan, according to the letter.
State statutes authorizing the private
entity to oversee public school athletics allow the
education commissioner to veto decisions of the NJSIAA's
executive board and give state education officials authority
to investigate the agency.
Librera had dispatched Warren County
Superintendent of Schools William King as his liaison to the
NJSIAA, and a member of its board, to study the
issue.
The organization has long been dogged by
allegations of fiscal abuse and price gouging at high school
playoff sporting events.
Democratic Assemblyman John Burzichelli,
of Paulsboro, spotlighted the issue after watching youths
shut out of a playoff football game last year in Paulsboro.
He and other critics object to the $7 to $12 prices charged
for tickets to championship events, calling them
excessive.
Six top executives at the agency -- all
retired school administrators collecting pensions between
$20,000 and $92,000 -- earn more than $80,000. Sands earns
$142,000 along with his $92,000 pension as a former
superintendent in Delsea Regional High School in
Glassboro.
In another example of what the NJSIAA's
opponents call waste and abuse, the agency spent $24,000 in
June 2004 to send 14 people, including the spouses of five
staff members, to a conference in San Diego.
In a reply letter to Librera, Sands said
the agency plans to comply with the request.
"Beginning last month we had already
initiated steps to change our travel policy as well as
reducing tournament tickets prices and (dropping) our
surplus below its present level," Sands said in the letter,
adding the NJSIAA finance committee might vote on a change
by Aug. 4.
"Clearly these extravagant lifestyles
with the salaries and the travel clearly have got to stop
and are not acceptable. It needs to be fixed," said
Burzichelli, sponsor of legislation allowing schools to opt
out of the NJSIAA if they feel it necessary.
Last week he called on the State
Commission on Investigations to probe spending at the
NJSIAA. Burzichelli praised Librera's call for the agency to
report on a reform plan.
"I would like it to go a little further.
I think the organization needs to bring in an independent
auditor," he said after learning of Librera's letter. "The
commissioner is asking specific questions. But I think there
is more to learn."
Among the many questionable expenses
highlighted in published reports was a $942 dinner for
executives at Harry Carey's restaurant, a Chicago eatery
founded by the legendary sports announcer.
Terrence Dopp is Trenton correspondent for The
Express-Times. He can be reached at 609-292-5154 or by
e-mail at tdopp@sjnewsco.com.
© 2005 The Express-Times. Used with
permission.
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