will affect the umpires and high school baseball in Texas? I know myself, I have decided to quit calling basketball because of it and know of others who will do the same. I have never called baseball but several friends who have decided to not suit up this upcoming season.

Word is for baseball they are looking to make it mandatory registration with the UIL to work varsity games. The UIL Legislatiuve Council is meeting yesterday and today to make their mandates.

I don't work basketball, but what I heard was that the new guy at UIL put the word out: no UIL registration, then no playoffs. Of course the fact that is against their own manual makes no difference.

Our chapter members will not be registering with the UIL period.

It's official. The proposal to have all officials register through the UIL has been passed by the UIL Athletic Council and the UIL Legislative Council for the 2010-2011 school year.

Freshmen and JV will get an influx of better officials. Varsity - ??????

Good luck everyone.

as a fan not familiar with all that is going on,
what would be the difference for the officials to be registered with UIL instead of TASO ?

pigbrain,

First, TASO was an advocate for the officials while the UIL is an advocate for the schools. Now that officials will be required to work for the UIL, who will represent them?

Second,
Felons are not allowed to be members of TASO but the UIL is willing to over look that if they are a good enough official. There are officials who were not allowed to be part of TASO but were still given playoff games by the UIL.

Third,
As we saw last year with baseball and the paycut for officials; why should we not expect more of that in all sports. There is a shortage of officials right now, so not sure how cutting pay will improve that.

I know of several officials in football, basketball and baseball that will no longer be calling because they refuse to be part of the UIL. These are guys that have called state title games in different sports in the last 5 years.

Sounds pretty arbitrary. Familiar with that down here.

I don't think all of you understand what is going to happen here. After speaking to some high school officials in different sports, none of them are going to join UIL, and your schools and kids are going to be left with very inexperiencedand lesser quality officials in all sports. This issue was supposed to be discussed in the UIL committee meetings with both sides able to make a presentation, and then voted upon by the UIL.
However, the UIL had already hired a new person whose title is director of officials and registration of officials before the vote and presentation by TASO was made to the committee. Sounds like it was a done deal no matter what TASO presented. If you know anyone who is a high school sports official, ask them about this situation and what their local chapters are going to do next season. You might be surprised to learn they are not going to work under this new arrangement. All of you high school parents who have paid lots of dollars for your child to have private lessons are now going to have their games officiated by little league and t-ball umpires in baseball

But if they don't work the games for the high schools where will they work? Who has a hold of the big end of the stick here?

don't worry, you won't have any problems with this in venezuela

Hahaha yes we have other problems here, but my son plays HS baseball in Texas.

The officials should be able to work sub-varsity games (for now), and they will still be able to work private school games.

My conversations show that not only do the officials not like it, but the coaches don't either. My understanding is that the new UIL Assistant AD, Tony Timmons, will be responsible for assigning crews for playoff games. Coaches will no longer have input as to who works their playoff.

It's too early to tell exactly how everything will pan out, but UIL had supervision of officials years ago. There was no training at all. Finally the UIL said the officials need to form their own organization. TASO has been working toward getting the officials on the same page. with that many officials it takes a while, but they were making good progress.

Forgot to mention something, not that any of you care. Until this changes back, I will just work college baseball and summer HS age. I will continue to be a TASO member and support them.

I've had it with the current UIL Exec. Director(and a few others).

UIL is a gov't organization following the lead & example of federal gov't takeover of personal privacy. Would you expect anything different?