Secessionists Encountering Opposition : CIF: Area baseball coaches say an Orange County break from the Southern Section would break up many rivalries.

Although several area high school baseball coaches have seen their teams endure some heartbreaking defeats to teams from Orange County, those coaches oppose a proposed secession by Orange County schools from the Southern Section of the California Interscholastic Federation.

“People say to me all the time, ‘Don’t you get tired of going down to Orange County?’ ” Simi Valley Coach Mike Scyphers said. “But I really don’t. The competitiveness we’ve established with those schools is good for high school baseball. I like the rivalries we’ve set up from afar.”

Those playoff rivalries would end if Orange County schools split off from the Southern Section and form their own section under a proposal that has generated support among county school officials. County school superintendents will meet Aug. 20 to vote on a proposal that would allow Orange County’s 72 high schools, with more than 100,000 students, to break from the sprawling 485-member Southern Section that stretches from San Clemente to San Luis Obispo, and from Calexico to Mammoth.

Those who support a new section, which would include all public, Catholic and private schools in Orange County, point with alarm to the increasing transportation costs and travel time for Southern Section playoff events. In addition, many of the county’s superintendents believe that the current voting system of the general council that rules the Southern Section is inequitable. Currently, private schools pay 11% of the Southern Section’s dues but control 37% of the votes.

Several Orange County public schools threatened to take the Southern Section to court earlier this year after the section placed private schools and public schools in the same leagues under the current releaguing plan that takes effect in the fall of 1992.

Msgr. Michael Harris, principal of Santa Margarita High, said a county section could be formed as soon as the fall of 1992 when Catholic schools join public leagues in the county for the first time.

If approved by county superintendents, the proposal first would have to be approved by the Southern Section’s Executive Committee, then its general council and then the State Federated Council of the CIF. The proposal is on the agenda for discussion at the Southern Section’s Executive Committee meeting, scheduled for Aug. 22.

“My understanding is (that) all the public schools are saying go,” said Peter Hartman, superintendent of the Saddleback Valley Unified School District. “If I had to bet, I would bet that it’s going to happen. The time is awfully close to right.

“The overriding thing, if anything is going to sell this, it’s going to be the transportation difficulty. It’s kind of inevitable that there’s going to be some ‘decentralization’ of the Southern Section. I think it’s too big.”

Stan Thomas, commissioner of the Southern Section, has reservations about the proposal but added, “If it can be done anywhere, Orange County can make it happen. The area has great facilities and outstanding leadership among its educators and administrators.”

Financial considerations loom as the biggest obstacle to the move, which would be the first within the Southern Section since San Diego County schools incorporated in 1960. That section has 75 member schools.

The Southern Section is primarily financed by membership dues, sports fees and football and basketball playoff revenues. The section operates under a $1 million budget with half of the income coming from playoff revenues. Member schools also pay 23 cents per student and a $15 fee for each sports program in its athletic department.

Thomas estimated that the Southern Section would lose $200,000 a year if Orange County formed its own section.

A feasibility study commissioned by county schools estimates that 72 county schools could operate under a $600,000 budget with $390,000 of the income generated from playoff revenue.

Dues would be raised from the current 23 cents that a school pays the Southern Section for each student to 35 cents per student. Members of the San Diego Section pay dues of 65 cents per student toward an operating budget of $622,000.

County schools also would receive less playoff revenue. The Southern Section keeps 50% of the gate during the playoffs, but the feasibility study called for the county section to receive 80% of playoff revenues.

“Do they (proponents of a new section) understand the costs that are going to be involved?” Thomas said. “No one from Orange County has come to this office and talked to our accountant. There are so many hidden costs like medical and dental benefits, state taxes, office equipments and furniture that keep going up.”

Thomas also raised questions about competitive balance in a new section.

“Some schools fit very nicely, some are caught in between, and then what are you going to do with the small private schools?” he said.

Area baseball coaches, whose teams compete in the Southern Section 5-A Division with Orange County teams from the Angelus, Empire and Sunset leagues, relish their playoff meetings with Orange County teams even though the results can make for a long ride home for the area team.

In Scyphers’ 13 years at Simi Valley, the Pioneers have met almost all of the top teams in Orange County, including Huntington Beach Edison, Placentia El Dorado, Anaheim Esperanza, Fountain Valley, Anaheim Katella, Huntington Beach Ocean View and Westminster. Scyphers estimates that Simi Valley has split those games, but Esperanza handed the Pioneers one of the school’s most painful defeats, a 5-4 loss in the playoff semifinals in 1986 when Simi Valley was ranked No. 1 in the country.

“What makes a (Southern Section) championship so sweet is it’s a tough row to hoe,” he said. “It’s a great accomplishment, and, if the Orange County teams leave, that would diminish it. If I win a title, I want to beat the best in our area.”

Westlake Coach Rich Herrera also saw an Orange County team end the Warriors’ quest for a mythical national championship when Marina of Huntington Beach knocked off Westlake in the semifinals in 1989. Westlake returned to Orange County last spring for a tournament hosted by Esperanza and El Dorado.

“If you’re the 5-A champ, you deserve to be the state champion,” Herrera said. “It would detract from the 5-A if the Orange County teams left. Playing the best, that’s what the playoffs are all about.”

Alemany Coach Jim Ozella voiced a similar sentiment, saying that the disappointment of a second-round loss in the playoffs in 1989 to Katella was eased by the knowledge that Alemany competed in a strong division. The Indians’ baseball team is the only program at the school that competes in the strongest Southern Section division. “To be honest, Orange County is producing better baseball than the Valley right now,” he said. “If (the Orange County schools) branch off, we’d be disappointed. Some coaches may say good riddance, but I think it would hurt the Southern Section.”

Ozella sympathized with concerns about travel, but some of his area counterparts dismissed that issue, saying mid-day traffic associated with baseball is tolerable no matter what the distance.

“That doesn’t amount to a hill of beans,” Crespi Coach Scott Muckey said. “That’s a poor excuse. Traffic isn’t that big of a hardship.”

Try telling that to the football coaches at El Toro and Mission Viejo Capistrano Valley. Those teams traveled from Orange County to Ventura for games against Buena and Ventura last fall in the first round of the Division II playoffs. An area team might make the return trip this fall.

Division II consists of the Channel, Marmonte, Pacific and San Gabriel Valley leagues, which are reasonably close geographically. The South Coast League--an all-Orange County league, is the division’s fifth league.

Despite the travel considerations--and a 59-30 loss to Capistrano Valley last year--Ventura Coach Harvey Kochel opposes an Orange County secession.

“Quite frankly, they were much better than us,” he said. “Still, I think the Orange County schools would miss the competition at playoff time. The Southern Section is so big. It’s such a unique entity with a good playoff system. I’d hate to see the Southern Section break up.”

Staff writer Tom Hamilton contributed to this story.