Tim Dimke and LaVonne Sheffield insisted all along that their plan to partner Rockford high school sports with the Rockford Park District would pass state regulatory rules, and the IHSA agreed after hearing their pitch this morning.“Most of what they talked about today will fly,” IHSA executive director Marty Hickman said today after meeting with six Rockford officials from 8:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. in Bloomington.”Overall, there was quite a bit of common ground. Primarily, if the school is going to maintain control of the interscholastic program, the responsible entity to us is going to be the ones to check eligibility, enter kids, hire coaches and do all the things schools are supposed to do, then I think their plan will work.”Hickman said last week that from what he had heard the plan would not meet IHSA requirements. The difference now is he doesn’t think the Park District is going to take over or run high school sports in Rockford, but rather it will be a partnership to take advantage of Park District facilities. That’s how he sees it now after meeting with Park District executive director Tim Dimke, Rockford director of athletics Carl Armato and four other school and Park District officials.”What we emphasized today is that the school has to maintain control of the programs,” Hickman said. “If we have an issue at a game with a Rockford public school, we will not be calling Tim. We will be reaching out to Carl or to one of the principals. They have to maintain control of the program, and that’s what they maintain they will do. There was quite a bit of common ground after we had a chance to talk.”
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We continue to hear how outsourcing interscholastic athletics costs the district $3 million dollars. Am I missing something? WHERE are the savings coming from?
Outsourcing means paying someone else. How much? What are the actual savings? Realistically it can not be $3 million. Sometimes as with staffing, outsourcing actually costs more, but savings are recouped in other ways.
Can anyone tell me WHAT are the savings to RPS205 and to the taxpayers of Rockford are?
Regardless the IHSA should of been involved at the beginning.
Outsourcing doesn’t cost $3 million. The entire athletics budget costs $3 million according to Superintendent LaVonne Sheffield. She has not said how much partnering with the Park District would save. The Sterling superintendent told me that partnering with the Park District there for middle school sports saved them $200,000.
I don’t know about the IHSA at the beginning, but I certainly would have talked to the IHSA before scheduling a news conference to announce the plan. We broke the story four days before the Park District wanted to, but even their original news conference would have been more than a week before they spoke to the IHSA. I guess they were that confident it would fly. Turns out, they were correct about that.
Thank you Matt- Please ask Dr. Sheffield and Tim Dimke for the proposed savings for Rockford. Can you do that for us???
Not that every dime does not count but Sheffield did not want the current budget to go back to committee for further review of potential cuts before it was passed and Bob Evans said at best reviewing the current budget would at best ONLY saved at best $1 million dollars.
We can save significantly more with cuts to the staff at 201 s. Madison Street without disrupting the education of our children.
Please try and print the projected savings for the district tomorrow. That would be awesome.
Matt,
With signing day coming up this week, will any RPS 205 (or Rockford at all) athletes (football) be signing with an FBS program? I wonder what that number looks like compared to similarly sized metro areas.
I can’t help but “what if”, and imagine if Rockford and RPS 205 truly developed and educated athletes from K-12.
I don’t understand what is in it for the park district. Additional expense as revenues continue to shrink. Please help me understand this part of the plan.
Matt, thank you for breaking this story. What was reported today was significantly different and improved over what was originally proposed. Public outcry had an effect. Pleaes explain the plan and savings. The article said it wa about facilities and the district still would do the hiring and management. How does this save money?
Thanks.
Well yeah from the beginning, if you don’t know what you’re proposing would work under IHSA guidelines, you get them involved right off the bat. Lucky for 205 it worked, otherwise it would of been more wasted time.
I\’m not sure it did work. The proposal is different than the original. But hey. Give the people of 205 credit for making it look like it was the original plan.
I remember when they went without sports back in the 76-77 school year. I was a senior in another school district and kids from Rockford left in droves to other places I don\’t think Rockford has ever recovered from that. The powers in the nic 10 are the schools that are not in the Rockford school system and that\’s too bad.