September 28, 2007
San Diego State faculty move to abolish football
Leon Rosenstein, emeritus professor of philosophy at San Diego State, will introduce a resolution in the faculty senate to abolish the SDSU football team on the grounds that it puts an undue strain on the university's finances.
While the non-binding resolution is not likely to pass the faculty senate, the move represents an under-current against both the administration and the athletic department in the wake of continued financial losses. Rosenstein says SDSU has promised that Aztec football would be a golden goose for the school, but the reality is the football program has not lifted the athletic department out of continued budget deficits.
“We constantly get these statements that (football) will make the alumni contribute and that it's really going to make money,” Rosenstein said. “But then when you ask where the money is, they say it isn't here yet, that it'll be here next year. Then next year comes and it's still deficit after deficit after deficit. You get tired of the lying.”
SDSU football has failed to relieve an athletics budget that in recent years has needed about $2.5 million or more from other university sources to make ends meet. Last year, after an eighth straight nonwinning football season, SDSU athletics needed about $2.7 million in “one-time” funding, which came largely from a university broadband contract. This year, one-time funding has been projected at $2.645 million, out of a total budget of about $27 million. That's in addition to about $5 million from the state general fund and about $5 million from student fees.
While all but roughly twenty athletic programs operate in the red (the NCAA won't say exactly which ones), the SDSU athletic department relies on the university for nearly 42 percent of its budget, versus the 21 percent Division I-A average.
“If you look hard enough you're always going to find somebody on campus who wants to get rid of sports,” SDSU head coach Chuck Long said. “But football is such a vital part, as well as athletics, of your university. It's so healthy for your school. It gets your students involved. It's great for a campus. I don't know why you would try to get rid of something like that.”Rosenstein said he targeted football because “that's where the real cost is.”
“If football fed itself and supported itself, I've got no problem,” he said.
Comments:
Lennie Collins
posted on September 28, 2007 11:48 AM — 68.93.134.47 — link — abuse?
said:
San Diego State has a beautiful college campus and is in a great city. Unfortunately the Padres are going to get ALL the love. The Chargers are going to get what is leftover. San Diego State football team is just not that good. I lived out in San Diego when Marshall Faulk attended SDSU in the fans went to go see him not the team. That team has not been decent since it blew a 52-17 lead to BYU. BYU came back to tie the game 52-52 and they went to the Holiday Bowl instead of SDSU.
Lennie Collins
posted on September 29, 2007 12:42 AM — 68.93.134.47 — link — abuse? said:
C-Dogg after Marshall Faulk left not to many fans kept interest in the football program. Maybe he can go back as a coach...maybe that will bring the fans back. It worked for the baseball team when they hired Tony Gywnn as manager.
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Ben Prather 
said:
posted on September 28, 2007 11:16 AM — 150.176.192.1 — link — abuse?SDSU might never be able to compete with UCLA and USC for the southern california fan base, even if San Deigo is a few dozen miles away from LA.
The issue is that football has promised to generate funds that they have not delivered on. This is accompanied by the fact that SDSU has had several years with sub-par performances.
The MWC has a Bowl pay out structure that is more favorable to the teams that go to the bowls than any other team. SDSU has been picked during the pre season to win a bowl birth, but has fallen short.
SDSU needs to start attending Bowl games and winning to atract the fans that will allow the athletic program to make good on their fiscal promises.
Two years in a row with one time payments of 2.7 million tells me that Rosenstein is correct that something is fishy in the accounting. Even he doesn't expect this motion to go anywhere. The purpose is to shine a spotlight on this issue.
If the athletic department needs the 2.7 million per year, budget for it. Don't repeatedly ask for a "one time payment."