Gordon Says He’ll Decide Fate of Titan Football by Mid-December

Cal State Fullerton President Milton A. Gordon said Tuesday he will decide the fate of the Titan football program by the second week of December, but not before receiving full consultation and a recommendation from the school’s Athletics Council.

Gordon has asked the eight-member council to spend the next four weeks soliciting suggestions from individuals and groups, both on campus and in the community, on the future of football at Fullerton--whether it should remain at the Division I-A level, be dropped to I-AA or eliminated.

Gordon, who saved football in January, 1991, despite an Athletics Council recommendation to drop it, also has asked the council to thoroughly discuss the matter and give him a recommendation on the program’s future on or before Nov. 30.

“I want this to be a very open process to ensure that all members of both the on-campus and external communities have the opportunity to provide input on this important matter,” Gordon said in a release issued by the university.

“The university has a long tradition of seeking broad consultation in arriving at decisions that affect the various communities it serves, and I believe this tradition is wise.”

The Athletics Council, which is chaired by Lee Gilbert, faculty athletics representative, and includes Athletic Director Bill Shumard and Senior Women’s Administrator Maryalyce Jeremiah, will have several issues to deal with:

--The athletic department does not have the money to adequately fund a team that can remain consistently competitive on the Division I-A level. The team currently allocates the equivalent of 33 scholarships--Division I-A schools may issue as many as 92--and has won only five games in the last three seasons.

--A drop to a Division I-AA, cost-containment conference would significantly reduce the program’s ability to generate revenue.

The football team has earned about $650,000 in guaranteed revenue in each of the last two seasons, mainly from playing impossible-to-win games at schools such as Georgia, Mississippi State and UCLA. It would not be able to schedule such games in Division I-AA.

The athletic department has proposed several budgets to the president’s office, outlining three scenarios--a department with Division I-A football, with I-AA football and without football. According to sources, the department would still run a significant annual deficit even if it downgraded football to Division I-AA.

--The school must move toward complying with Title IX, the 1972 federal statute that prohibits sexual discrimination in education.

As part of an out-of-court settlement that included the reinstatement of women’s volleyball in May, the school agreed to improving its athletic participation ratio to 60% male/40% female by the 1997-98 school year.

The ratios are currently 69% male and 31% female, but dropping football would bring the school into the 60-40 ratio.

The other Athletics Council members are Sal Rinella, vice president for administration, Judith Anderson, executive assistant to the president, Matt Casana, Associated Students representative, Joyce Flocken, Academic Senate representative, and Jerry Conrey, Titan Athletic Foundation representative.

None of the eight was on the Athletics Council that recommended dropping football in 1991.