'RESOLUTION TO ABOLISH PROGRAM FORTHCOMING
By Brent Schrotenboer
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

September 27, 2007


A longtime San Diego State faculty member is sponsoring a resolution to abolish the Aztecs football program [Whoa! Talk about the shooting the moon.] because of its failure to generate revenue as promised and because of the strain he says that puts on academics.

Leon Rosenstein, emeritus professor of philosophy, said the resolution will be introduced at Tuesday's faculty senate meeting.

He and other faculty don't expect the resolution to succeed, largely because even if it passed a senate vote, the resolution would only serve in an advisory role to SDSU President Stephen Weber, who steadfastly backs football [Steadfastly ain't the half of it. The man's an obsessive. This sort of faculty intervention may be the only thing that can do any good].


But Rosenstein said his intent is to generate discussion about what he calls “lies” about athletics funding through the years. Such a resolution never previously has been introduced, according to Rosenstein, who has logged more than 25 years with the senate.

“We constantly get these statements that (football) will make the alumni contribute and that it's really going to make money,” Rosenstein said. “But then when you ask where the money is, they say it isn't here yet, that it'll be here next year. Then next year comes and it's still deficit after deficit after deficit. You get tired of the lying.” [The faculty gets tired of the lying. Everyone else at SDSU seems happy to be treated year after year as if they're mentally challenged.]

SDSU football has failed to relieve an athletics budget that in recent years has needed about $2.5 million or more from other university sources to make ends meet. Last year, after an eighth straight nonwinning football season, SDSU athletics needed about $2.7 million in “one-time” funding, which came largely from a university broadband contract. This year, one-time funding has been projected at $2.645 million, out of a total budget of about $27 million. That's in addition to about $5 million from the state general fund and about $5 million from student fees.

Rosenstein's resolution states this shortfall of nearly $3 million could be enough to staff “approximately 550 courses with part-time faculty or to establish 35 new tenured full professorships.” Rosenstein, who came to SDSU in 1969, said the philosophy department formerly had 18 tenured members; now it has nine. Other departments have had similar staffing issues, he said, at a time when students in general education courses have increased.

Weber wrote in a statement in May that SDSU expects “investments made in football in the last two years will take time to bring a return.” SDSU spokesman Jack Beresford said yesterday the SDSU administration declined comment on the resolution.



Like a great majority of other Division I-A athletic departments, SDSU operates in the red and needs support from the university general fund, student fees and other university sources. But at SDSU, those university allocations have represented about 42 percent of its athletics budget in recent years. That's roughly double the Division I-A average for university allocations to athletics (21.6 percent), according to NCAA research released in May. [Note that percentage, please.]

“If you look hard enough you're always going to find somebody on campus who wants to get rid of sports,” SDSU head coach Chuck Long said. “But football is such a vital part, as well as athletics, of your university. It's so healthy for your school. It gets your students involved. It's great for a campus. I don't know why you would try to get rid of something like that.” [Beautifully and powerfully expressed.]

Rosenstein said he targeted football because “that's where the real cost is.”

“If football fed itself and supported itself, I've got no problem,” he said.

Football had $7.3 million in expenses in fiscal 2005-06, according to the most recently available audit report. Its revenue, which includes tickets, donations and conference funds, was $4.77 million (not counting $890,353 in university support). Since 2005-06, coaching salaries increased, but ticket sales decreased. [University football programs lavishly reward losing coaches.]

Other faculty members who have spoken up on the issue say they're not football haters.

“I think there are people here who would say, 'Show me the numbers, and if the numbers work, this is great,' ” said Steve Barbone, associate professor of philosophy. “But if the numbers don't work, you've got to fix it.”

Rosenstein said he expects a movement to quash his resolution on technical grounds because this year he is serving as a substitute member of the faculty senate. Faculty Senate Chairwoman Edith Benkov said she's “not sure it's in the bylaws for a substitute senator to introduce a resolution.”

Rosenstein disagrees with that but says even if he's not allowed to introduce it, he has colleagues who will.

“The sad fact is that football has a Halliburton-esque 'cost-plus' contract, whereas dull, boring academics has to get by on the leavings,” English professor Peter Herman stated. “The more people hear about this, both inside and outside SDSU, the better.”' [Well, UD's doing her bit. She heard about it because the newspaper knows a story when it sees one, and now she's writing about it on her blog.]

'Resolution regarding Football at SDSU

To be presented to the SDSU Senate on October 2, 2007

Whereas football at SDSU (commonly known as “The Aztecs”) for the past several years appears to have been running a deficit in the neighborhood of 3 million dollars each year,

Whereas, despite assurances to the contrary, year after year, this deficit has continued, and year after year there has been no reason to believe that this situation will change,

Whereas it has been claimed that football helps to bring money into the university, but there has been no proof to support this claim; indeed, there is only evidence to the contrary,

Whereas it has been stated on this Senate floor that “it takes money to be the best, and the Aztecs just want to be the best” as a way to justify continued deficit spending on athletics while there is evidence that academics is not funded “to be the best, ” ignoring the academic needs of many departments,

Whereas the permanent increase lobbied for by President Weber himself at the May meeting of the IAA for Athletics of $2.7 million (which exceeds by almost ¾ million dollars the permanent budget increase recommended for Academic Affairs), certainly seems to indicate this year’s plan for covering anticipated future deficits,

Whereas the salary of the head coach of the Aztecs and his 12 assistants as reported in the Union Tribune (over $2 million) exceeds the entire budgets of some, if not many, academic departments,

Whereas this apparent annual $3 million deficit would be adequate to staff approximately 550 courses with part-time faculty or to establish 35 new tenured full professorships throughout the university or to add 2 full professors to every department in the CAL or to cover the full cost of the entire faculty salaries of some smaller colleges,

Whereas, San Diego State University’s mission is an academic one, not an entertainment one, and, as an institution of higher learning should dedicate all its resources to teaching, learning, and research,

And Whereas any additional funds (i.e., funds not already dedicated to specified purposes) in possession of the University should be used for that mission and not for extra-curricular activities that carry such a high cost burden,

Therefore Be It Resolved That it is the sense and will of the SDSU Senate that football (“The Aztecs”) be abolished effective with the end of the Fall 2007 semester and that this occur not withstanding any prior contracts or commitments of any kind.'