No Warning for Athletes Is the Cruelest Cut of All

If a large company closes its doors and lays off half its workers, 60 days’ notice is required under federal law.

If Cal State Northridge wants to leave the Big Sky Conference, it must give one year’s notice.

But if any university in California decides to drop a sports program, it can do so tomorrow without so much as an hour’s warning.

It’s an injustice that has affected dozens of student-athletes this decade, forcing them to suddenly confront uncertain futures.

Careers have ended and dreams have vanished because schools did not have the common courtesy of notifying athletes in time for them to find other schools. Teams have disbanded because schools waited too long to rally community support.

The cancellation of four men’s sports teams at Northridge in 1997 and the subsequent public outcry inspired a group of college coaches, community activists and politicians to seek a solution.

State Sen. Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley), who helped reinstate Northridge’s sports programs with a one-time $586,000 emergency state bailout, introduced Senate Bill 338 that would require California State universities and community colleges to give at least one year’s notice before cutting a sport. The University of California system would not come under Wright’s bill unless its regents acted on the matter.

The state Senate approved the measure in May, by a 26-4 vote. Charles Reed, chancellor of the CSU system, ordered his lobbyist to oppose the bill, claiming a one-year notice would remove budget flexibility needed by CSU presidents.

Wright determined that she did not have enough votes in the Assembly Committee on Higher Education and pulled the bill.

Early next year, she intends to try again to convince Assembly members that a one-year notification is fair and appropriate.

“There’s nothing in this bill that takes away flexibility,” Wright said. “If they want to stop a program, just notify. So many of these students are disadvantaged, who wouldn’t get into a university if they didn’t get in on a scholarship. [The schools] go out and solicit young people to come in, then kill the sports.”

Cutting sports programs became more prevalent starting in the early 1990s, when tuition costs rose and the state economy was in recession. Gender-equity requirements added to the problem for college presidents.

In rapid fashion, football was dropped at UC Santa Barbara and Long Beach State after the 1991 season, at Cal State Fullerton in 1992, at San Francisco State in 1994, at Pacific in 1995, at Chico State in 1996. UC Irvine dropped baseball in 1992, the same year Fullerton killed men’s gymnastics. Men’s swimming and gymnastics were discontinued at UCLA in 1994.

Few athletes endured a more traumatic year of college than John Wilson.

On the final day of September 1996, Wilson’s father fired two shotgun blasts through the locked front door of the family home, wounding his son in the chest and arm. Wilson spent two weeks in the hospital recovering. Jack Wilson was sent to prison for attempted murder.

The injuries forced Wilson to redshirt his freshman baseball season at Northridge. Just as Wilson was preparing to play summer ball in Santa Maria with three Northridge teammates, the school announced it was dropping baseball.

“We get a call from our parents, ‘The program is dropped and you need to find another place to play,’ ” Wilson said. “That should not be allowed to happen. There are certain things in life you come to depend on. The university is one, family is the other. For me, both were taken away in a matter of months.”

Disbelief turned into anger and frustration because Northridge had given no warning. At the time of the announcement, the spring semester was over, students were on summer break, college registration deadlines had passed and most schools had already committed their scholarships.

“Northridge might not be on the caliber of UCLA, USC or Arizona in terms of the total university package, but those were the schools I turned down to go to Northridge,” Wilson said. “People assume athletes at schools that have programs dropped aren’t very good and [say], who cares? That wasn’t the case. These were quality athletes. It made us feel worthless.”

Northridge’s decision, announced June 11, 1997, was a regretful moment of administrative incompetence. An outraged San Fernando Valley community expressed itself with dozens of irate letters, e-mail messages and phone calls. Less than two months later, the Northridge administration reversed itself and reinstated baseball, men’s volleyball, men’s swimming and men’s soccer.

But the damage had been done. Athletes were unsure if the programs were on solid ground, leading to mass defections. Incoming recruits abandoned Northridge for junior colleges or other four-year schools.

Northridge baseball Coach Mike Batesole worked the phones frantically, trying to place his top players at other schools. A few lucky ones got last-minute scholarships. Wilson ended up at Kentucky. Another player went to Long Beach State, still another to San Jose State.

“It was devastating,” Batesole said. “We’re not talking about money here, we’re talking about people’s lives. That’s way more important than a few dollars. The people who are making the decision where the dollars go, maybe they should have had a five-year plan.”

Wright’s bill does more than give athletes a year to find another school after a program is cut. It forces a school to take responsibility when discontinuing a sports team and opens the decision to public scrutiny and discussion. The notice might even result in a solution to save the program.

In 1991, UCLA decided to drop men’s water polo, but enough notice was given that a group of boosters raised enough money to endow the sport until the athletic department regained its financial footing. Today, water polo is fully funded by the athletic department.

UCLA also demonstrated that giving a year’s notice can work effectively. The men’s swimming and gymnastics teams were notified in August of 1993 that they would be dropped after the 1993-94 season to help cut a $900,000 department deficit.

The programs weren’t saved, but the athletes were able to compete for a year and market themselves to other schools. Those who did not transfer were allowed to keep their scholarships.

“We could have [killed the sports immediately], but opted not to do that, in fairness to the students,” UCLA Athletic Director Peter Dalis said.

More men’s teams in California face possible extinction because of terms from the settlement of a 1993 lawsuit brought by the California chapter of the National Organization for Women against all schools in the CSU system. The schools were supposed to raise their ratio of female athletes to about 50%, beginning in the fall of 1998. Schools with football programs have either had to add women’s teams or cut men’s teams to move closer to the ratio.

Community colleges have faced a similar financial crisis this decade, with sports teams first on the chopping block. Only recently did College of the Canyons and East L.A. College reinstate football.

Mission College in Sylmar discontinued its entire athletic program in the summer of 1997 after facing a $2-million campus deficit.

“I was comfortable at school,” said former Mission baseball player Albert Palma. “All of a sudden, they pulled you aside during a workout and said, ‘There’s no more program.’ There was no warning. It left me confused about my future.”

Palma transferred to College of the Canyons, played one more season and is now attending Northridge and trying to become a teacher and coach.

“It was a situation awkward to deal with,” he said. “I went from being one of the team captains to a guy having to take a back seat. A lot of people struggled at other schools.”

Asked what he learned from the situation, Palma said, “If I know ahead of time, I would be honest. I felt let down. I felt they really misled us.”

Assemblyman Jack Scott (D-Pasadena), a former president at Pasadena City College, said Wright’s bill is too sweeping and would leave college presidents hamstrung in times of fiscal insolvency.

But the bill doesn’t prevent presidents from killing a sport. All it does is give student-athletes a reasonable and fair notification period to look elsewhere.

It’s the right thing to do. It’s the honorable thing to do.

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Eric Sondheimer is The Times’ columnist for the Valley/Ventura County edition. He can be reached at (818) 772-3422 or eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.