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The Freedom Caucus took a break from trying to shut down universities, close libraries, and eliminate public education for a minute and actually solved a problem facing youth and youth activities across the state. They failed at almost everything they tried in the legislative session, but they were able to cut funding for school activities. In their twisted minds, cutting activities, not providing lunch for hungry kids, and attempting to micromanage education were seen as a victory.
What they didn’t foresee (do they ever?) was how their cutting of middle school and high school activities affected the growing shortage of athletic officials in nearly every sport. Thanks to the “Freedom” folks, the shortage won’t be as severe since many schools won’t be fielding teams this fall, or at least at the previous level.
The cuts are severe.
In Shoshoni, the Freedom Caucus-based legislation resulted in a loss of $100,000 from Fremont County School District 24’s activities budget. That’s a substantial drop in funding.
Shoshoni decided to cut youth sports entirely. That means fifth and sixth grade track, basketball, and volleyball, along with the other sports the young Wranglers play. The only exception is that sixth graders may be able to play football if there aren’t enough players in the seventh and eighth grades.
Will it be a detriment to the kids of Shoshoni? Does a bear… well, you know. Of course it will. They’ll be denied healthy, team-based activities that teach different aspects of life that you just can’t do in a classroom.
Will it lower the competitiveness of the middle school and, by default, the high school programs? Sure, it will, but the “Freedom” clowns evidently didn’t get that message from Washington, D.C., or Phoenix during the last legislative session.
There is more to representative government than waiting for the next text to arrive from some clandestine source out-of-state telling you how to vote on a bill or how to word an amendment.
A look around the state and the county reveals similar plans to Shoshoni’s in place at schools of all sizes.
In Riverton, the Wolverines and Spartans will continue business as usual, at least for the upcoming year. Riverton will dip into reserves to keep its athletic and activities programs afloat.
It’s not that way everywhere. In Powell, the Panthers face a 42% cut in their activities budget. That doesn’t mean just football, wrestling, basketball, track, volleyball, soccer, swimming, and cross country, it means speech and debate, band, choir, art, and activities like FFA, FBLA, and student council.
“There are lots of unknowns going around the athletic world,” Riverton Activities Director Max Mills said. “The legislature cut everybody’s budget by about 40%. It affects all the life lessons and non-academic things that kids are taught. Losing those things is awful.”
Years ago, at a scheduling meeting, my friend Ernie Mecca of Dubois chastised me when I brought up how far we had to travel. In those days, the Wranglers might be at Byron on a Friday Night and in Big Piney the next afternoon. The Rams faced the same dilemma.
“Listen, buddy,” Ernie said to me. “We travel 100 miles to Shoshoni, then we play the same teams you do.”
Ernie was right. Dubois is the most isolated school in Fremont County. The rest are as ideally located as any school across the state. From Shoshoni to Lander and Pavillion to St. Stephen’s, we’re all geographically advantaged compared to the schools on the periphery of the state.
In Pine Bluffs, activities director Will Gray had to start canceling volleyball and wrestling tournaments since the Hornets are adjusting to the budget cuts by reducing travel costs.
Overnight trips and meals are expensive. If you live in Pine Bluffs, the nearest consistent Class 2-A opponent is in Wright, about 250 miles away. The Hornets have closer teams in Southeast Goshen, Lusk, and Lingle-Ft. Laramie, but these teams all fluctuate between 1-A and 2-A in every reclassification cycle.
It would be much easier for Pine Bluffs to compete in Nebraska and Colorado. There are dozens of teams in those neighboring states within 75 miles.
Pine Bluffs and Dubois aren’t alone. It’s a long way from anywhere for Little Snake River and Cokeville. Budget cuts to travel in these isolated border towns equals the end of activities.
Many bean counters claim that money could be saved if speech meets and tournaments were shortened to single-day events. They tried it with a speech meet in Afton, at Star Valley High School.
There’s a reason Star Valley plays its non-conference football schedule against Idaho teams. They’re on the border.
For Riverton or Lander speech teams to compete at Star Valley in a one-day competition, they’d still have to stay overnight. Big meets begin competition early in the morning. If you’ve ever driven to Star Valley, well, let’s just say, you can’t get there from here, at least not unless you load the kids on the bus at 4 a.m. and return after midnight.
The Ron Thon, the best wrestling tournament, including the state tournament, in Wyoming, is in jeopardy next spring due to travel restrictions imposed by the legislature.
The girls begin wrestling the day before the boys’ tournament starts. It’s a three-day event with thousands of matches on mats crowded into every available space at the Riverton Middle and High Schools.
If the teams can’t stay overnight, that limits competition to just local teams or perhaps those in the Big Horn Basin and just over the mountain in Sublette County.
Star Valley is implementing a “pay to play” requirement starting with football. Every player must pay $70 to compete on the gridiron.
While that looks great to some, it will, in reality, become a coaching nightmare. When little Jimmy or Nancy doesn’t get the playing time, their mom, Snowplow Karen, will storm into the district office and demand they get on the field, after all, they “paid to play.”
Shoshoni is requiring students to pay for their own meals on trips next year, aside from culminating events. That brings into question the free and reduced lunch policy that requires schools to feed children from lower economic backgrounds. How do you meet that requirement on a field trip to the planetarium in Casper? Do you single out the kids on free and reduced and feed them, while requiring the other students to pay?
That’s a Snowplow Karen lawsuit just waiting to happen.
There might be one positive aspect to the reduction in activities budgets as it relates to travel.
High school boys’ and girls’ basketball has devolved into endless tournaments. Some schools play just four or five home games in a 30-game schedule thanks to the incessant tournament season. It’s become common for schools to begin basketball practice in November but not have a home game until February, with just three weeks remaining in the regular season.
The elimination or reduction of overnight trips will adversely affect all these tournaments. The same is true for volleyball, where home matches are a rarity, usually reserved just for conference games or perhaps for an intra-class matchup with a local rival.
Home on Friday, away on Saturday was how scheduling was once done. With the acceleration of tournaments, it changed to Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, 300 miles away in Cheyenne, or equally as far in Mountain View, Sheridan, Hanna, Wright, or “close” tournaments just 120 miles away in Casper.
The Freedom Caucus is, as usual, looking for a problem to justify their solution, a solution that does nothing but harm children.
Remember them in August at the polls.