Tie Vote Saves Foothill From Releaguing : League Gets New Life After Southern Section Sets Aside Proposal

The enduring Foothill League, which dates to 1927 but had been earmarked for extinction, earned a reprieve Thursday at the Southern Section Council meeting during which eight of nine releaguing proposals were ratified.

The council, composed of representatives of the section’s 66 leagues, approved releaguing plans that will, among other moves, send Agoura High to the Marmonte League, Fillmore to the Frontier League, Alemany to a newly formed parochial-schools league, and Servite to the Del Rey League. The releaguing plans will take effect for a two-year period beginning in the 1990-91 school year.

Foothill League members also expected a move, but Foothill-area representatives (a seven-league body) reached a stalemate Thursday on a plan that would have sent Burbank, Burroughs and Hart to a realigned, eight-team Pacific League with current league members Crescenta Valley, Glendale, Hoover, Muir and Pasadena.

Foothill-area schools, including Foothill League members, approved the proposal, 26 to 16, in April. But in Thursday’s action, Foothill-area leagues split on the issue. Voting in favor were the Mission Valley, Rio Hondo and Whitmont leagues. Dissenting were the Golden, Pacific and Suburban leagues. The Foothill League abstained.

At the April releaguing meeting, all eight members of the newly aligned Pacific League voted against the proposal.

Now, because of a Southern Section mandate that calls for releaguing every two years, the Foothill-area schools must return to the drawing board. They tentatively have scheduled a meeting for Oct. 4.

“I’m surprised but very pleased by the vote,” said Laurence Strauss, Hart’s principal and the Foothill League president. “It is my hope that we come up with a proposal that keeps our area at status quo until the next releaguing cycle. We really need to plan long-range. To releague now and then have to releague again doesn’t make any sense.”

Strauss cited the opening of two high schools in Antelope Valley and Palmdale, and the projected opening of a fourth high school in the Santa Clarita Valley as factors in future releaguing considerations.

Alemany will become the second valley-area school to leave the Del Rey League in three years, joining Notre Dame. Crespi and St. Francis are the only area teams in the new six-team Del Rey League that also will include Bosco Tech, St. John Bosco, Loyola and Servite.

Alemany will join the newly formed Mission League with Bishop Amat, Bishop Montgomery, Mater Dei, St. Bernard and St. Paul. Notre Dame remains a charter member of the San Fernando Valley League, which is unchanged.

Agoura will leave the Frontier League to join the Marmonte League, which will grow to eight teams. Fillmore will move from the Tri-Valley to the Frontier.