It also generates such excitement and good will among alumni that they will want to make donations to the school.
These are two things we’re always told about football and basketball at our universities.
But it’s one thing to be told this. It’s another to hear about it from people who’ve been there.
Justin Sugg is a columnist for the Daily Iowan, the University of Iowa newspaper.
[I had a] a phone conversation with an alumnus years ago. I was working for the UI Foundation and was trying to extract a donation. He interrupted my pitch and asked, “Is any of this going to the football program? Because I’m hanging up now if it is.” I told him no and explained all the money raised that day went directly to the students.
He wasn’t alone in his misgivings. Many people I solicited feared their hard-earned money would go toward what they believed to be an overly compensated program.
And that’s understandable, considering current football coach Kirk Ferentz is the highest-paid official working for a state-sponsored program, with an annual salary of more than $3 million…
On the other hand, Justin goes on to detail the many ways in which Iowa athletics does raise revenue, among them this one:
[W]hat I call the “drunk tax” — fines for alcohol-related violations — brought in $87,600 in 2008, according to a DI series last fall.
Yeah, the drunk tax is a good one… Iowa can look to other cities for similar sorts of taxes… solicitation tax… property destruction tax… When your municipality specializes in activities that make people act like assholes, sources of revenue enhancement abound.