Saving soccer is risky play for Dems
Never underestimate the tenacity of New Mexico’s state legislators. They can grandstand, meddle in other people’s business and milk a hot topic better than any mayor or congressman.
To prove it, Democrats in the state House of Representatives are on a mission to save the men’s soccer team at the University of New Mexico.
The state’s unemployment and poverty rates are among the worst in America. Quality teachers are hard to find and harder to retain. Social workers are in short supply. Roadways are in deplorable shape.
Yet Democratic state representatives say funding the men’s soccer program at UNM is a priority.
Whether collegiate soccer survives is a small and unimportant matter. But it’s a useful political issue for lawmakers trying to be all things to all people.
They know that UNM’s seven-member board of regents
has taken plenty of heat since July, when it voted to eliminate the men’s soccer program. The regents also decided to discontinue the skiing teams for men and women and beach volleyball for women.
Keep in mind that UNM’s athletic department had overspent budgets and run up a deficit of more than $4 million. Politicians had clamored for the university jockocracy to join the real world by making cuts.
The regents did so, only to see House Democrats press them to reverse their decision to eliminate the men’s soccer program.
“We offered to work with the regents and President [Garnett] Stokes,” said House Speaker Brian Egolf, D-Santa Fe. “They just flat-out rejected our offer of help.”
I asked Egolf why Democratic House members are so interested in a soccer team when bigger problems exist.
“One, UNM soccer is a very successful program,” Egolf said. “Two, its coach is among the top coaches in college soccer. And I think I read somewhere that 80 percent of the athletes are from New Mexico. It was really serving New Mexico students.”
Of course, none of this justifies legislators intruding on the regents’ turf by trying to run the athletic department of a university.
Egolf had a ready response for that criticism. Just because the regents decided to cut soccer doesn’t mean it’s a good idea, he told me.
This sort of micromanaging is one reason boards of regents in New Mexico are so ineffective.
Governors typically stack university governing boards with cronies and campaign donors. School presidents run the show while their bosses bask in the prestige of being called a regent.
But now, in the rare instance when a board of regents made a tough decision, House Democrats want to overturn it.
Egolf told me his caucus is interested in more than soccer, though that’s the issue Democrats have highlighted.
He said they also want to restore academic budgets that were cut in recent years when the state couldn’t pay its bills. And, he said, they intend to save the women’s beach volleyball team to make sure federal Title IX requirements are met. The law mandates equal spending on men’s and women’s athletic programs at schools receiving federal funding.
Still undecided is how House Democrats would rescue the UNM men’s soccer team from the graveyard. One possibility is adding a specific line item in the budget to pay for the program. It costs about $700,000 a year.
That’s not a fortune in a state budget of more than $6 billion. But it’s still a substantial amount, given all of New Mexico’s needs.
And what if the regents stick to their position to eliminate the men’s soccer team?
Egolf said Democratic Gov.-elect Michelle Lujan Grisham can make as many as five appointments to the UNM Board of Regents in January. Once her choices are confirmed by the state Senate, men’s soccer would again be alive and kicking.
All this proves is that nobody has a shorter attention span than a New Mexico state legislator.
Only three years ago, revenues plunged and state government couldn’t pay its bills. Legislators took back money from larger school districts just to cover everyday expenses.
They also “swept” other state accounts to find cash. Their tactics were similar to a hand-to-mouth couple looking under the sofa cushions in hopes of finding loose change to pay for groceries.
But now, with a surplus of at least $1 billion likely because of a boom in the oil industry, Democratic lawmakers are ready to save soccer.
What the heck, they say. It’s a worthy program, so maintaining can’t hurt.
We’ll see if they’re still talking that way when the next bust occurs, as it surely will, and the soccer team becomes an uncomfortable appendage.
Ringside Seat is an opinion column about people, politics and news. Contact Milan Simonich at msimonich@sfnewmexican.com or 505-986-3080.