ROSE BOWL / DAILY REPORT : WISCONSIN : Congressman Wants Ticket Probe

Disgruntled Wisconsin fans who paid for Rose Bowl tickets only to be told by ticket agencies that they were unavailable scrambled Friday for seats to the New Year’s Day game.

The debacle prompted Rep. Scott Klug, R-Wis., to ask U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno to investigate the possible fraudulent sale of Rose Bowl tickets and decide whether federal laws were broken.

The investigation would be too late to help out-of-luck Wisconsin fans. Several in the Biltmore were discussing filing lawsuits against tour operators.

Less than 24 hours before ninth-ranked Wisconsin was to play No. 14 UCLA in college football’s oldest bowl game, hundreds of Wisconsin fans hit the streets and combed newspaper classified ads looking for tickets.

Demand for Rose Bowl tickets has driven prices up as much as 13 times the $46 face value. Seats were being advertised Friday for as much as $475 each.

Some fans gathered in hotel lobbies to swap news about possible ticket sources and to commiserate.

The concierge desk at the Biltmore Hotel was swamped with fans pleading for help.

Wisconsin, of the Big Ten, received 18,000 tickets, less than half the 40,000 that Pac-10 champion UCLA was allotted for its fans.

The problem has taken the California attorney general’s office by surprise.

“It’s not something that we’ve had in regard to the Rose Bowl before, so it’s not an issue we were even prepared for,” said Herschel Elkins, head of the California consumer law division of the attorney general’s office.

There is very little regulation of the ticket brokerage industry in California. However, it is a misdemeanor to sell tickets on the grounds of the venue in excess of the face value without permission from the venue. That law is heavily enforced on New Year’s Day.

Wisconsin fans are discouraged. “I looked at the T-shirts in the gift shop and I thought, ‘I don’t want anything to remind me of Los Angeles or the Rose Bowl,’ ” said Dorothy Grubb of Madison. “My sincere hope is that Wisconsin makes it next year and no one goes. They can keep their tickets.”

Gustof Peterson and his wife also lacked tickets promised by Southtown Travel, and were planning to watch Saturday’s game on TV after traveling from Las Cruces, N.M.

“Don’t underestimate Wisconsin fans,” Peterson said. “They may tear this place down before it’s over.”