Pierce Fails to Reinstate Football : Talks for Coach End in Failure

Football will not be reinstated at Pierce College in time for the 1987 season, school President David Wolf said Wednesday.

Wolf informed Pierce administrators of his decision in a brief statement that was the antithesis of negotiations that dragged on for nearly three months.

“It’s all over,” he said. “I wish it had come out differently, but we have run out of time for this year.

“We tried to meet all the requirements the district had placed upon us, and I thought we were coming close. But the final calculation this morning was that we weren’t getting closer, and rather than getting into protracted discussions that might result in only a small chance that we could get it back this year, I made the decision.”

As a result, Pierce will be without football a second straight year. The program, after winning its third consecutive conference championship, was dropped last June because of a tight budget and the lack of a qualified coach after Jim Fenwick resigned and took a voluntary coaching position at Cal State Northridge.

None of those obstacles remained for Pierce this time around. Wolf said he had the money in his budget to fund the team, and a qualified coach had been selected in Steve Butler, an instructor at West Los Angeles College who formerly coached at Crespi High and Valley College.

The problem was in getting Butler to Pierce. Faculty layoffs in the Los Angeles Community College District last June made intradistrict transfer of teachers possible only through exchange. To bring in Butler from West L.A., therefore, Pierce would have to transfer one of its teachers to West L.A. The transfer would have to satisfy the needs of West L.A., which also needs a football coach to revive a program dropped last June.

Bargaining for the exchange was unsuccessful. Wolf then attempted to convince the district that Pierce had a special need for Butler’s services. The district responded that Pierce is already overstaffed in physical education.

Wolf’s only recourse was to ask the district to make Pierce a special exception, but he said that wouldn’t have come in time--if at all--to bring back football for next season.

“It would take some time to go that route,” he said. “I’m prepared to do that, but we’ve been asking Steve Butler to show patience for the last 2 1/2 weeks, which was already beyond anything we told him would be a reasonable time to wait.

“I could not in good conscience ask Steve Butler to wait any longer. It’s not right for him. He’s got to make plans based on reality, not a wish.”

Butler returned home from teaching PE classes at West L.A. on Wednesday night to learn his wish hadn’t come true.

Said Butler: “In my heart, I honestly felt something positive would happen. I felt it had to work out because it’s wrong for it not to work out.

“They’ve got the funding for the program, the community needs it and there’s been a tremendous response from interested players about returning the football program to Pierce. I can’t believe that it couldn’t be pulled together. I know Dave Wolf tried everything possible. I just don’t know where the fault lies. I wish someone could tell me.”

This is the second straight yearButler has had a coaching job taken away. Last year, he lost his position as an assistant when West L.A dropped its program.

Said Butler: “I want to coach football, and I feel I should be doing that. I don’t feel good about myself unless I’m doing something productive, and coaching football is something I think I do well. Now they’ve taken that away from me again.”