Dangers lurk in unfilled jobs

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Commentary by Dan Thompson

A day before Idaho State's season-opening football game against Boise State, Chris Holmesly, the Bengals' starting safety, was declared ineligible.

Apparently his junior college grades didn't all transfer as planned, and repeated reminders during the spring weren't adequately heeded. No one ever really did anything substantial to fix the problem, mostly because the person who should have known how to address it -- a full-time compliance officer -- hadn't yet been hired.

And so, 36 hours before he was set to play in the biggest game of his life, Holmesly found out his season was over because of something he figured was sorted out months before.

If you scrape away at a building's foundation, it becomes vulnerable. That's the risk Idaho State has taken by shuffling its department and eliminating or suspending six administrative jobs in an effort to save money and climb out of the $800,000 hole it fell into two years ago.

As Holmesly's situation illustrates, such a decision means some things will get overlooked, and sometimes student athletes are made to pay for those decisions.

First off, though, there is one clear lesson in this situation: The compliance director position never should have been allowed to sit dark for six months.

Without a compliance director, an athletic department is baking without a recipe. Compliance directors ensure that the NCAA's rules are being followed. Also with the help of academic coordinators, they ensure that athletes keep their grades properly afloat.

These are important tasks that have nothing to do with a 4-3 defense or the spread offense. Those are the domain of a coach; GPAs and bylaws are the domain of a compliance department.

After its former compliance director left at the new year, Idaho State turned over the duties to a two-day-a-week part-timer until this summer, when Joel Vickery accepted the position permanently.

While certainly there is blame enough to go around concerning Holmesly's ineligibility -- grades and transfer regulations can't be that hard to match up -- his was a situation that a compliance officer could have sorted out well in advance.

But the compliance officer position wasn't the only one that sat unfilled at Idaho State. Three others jobs were eliminated entirely.

Two of the empty desks were occupied by administrative assistants in the football and basketball offices (contrary to what Chad Teichert wished for at a recent news conference, his volleyball offices never housed a secretary). The third was the position formerly held by Mike Pritchett, the director of marketing, promotions and game operations. His was effectively absorbed into another person's role.

Additionally, the assistant sports information director went unhired for a year but has since been filled, and the assistant athletic director for marketing and sales position that Jeff Tingey held hasn't been filled -- rightly so -- since he was named interim athletic director.

But when a position is left vacant there are repercussions, likely longer hours and more responsibilities for someone else.

If indeed many duties formerly handled by administrative assistants are now being handled by Idaho State coaches, another mistake like that concerning Holmesly will be made.

I'm sure Idaho State would love to carve its way out of a deficit by drawing paychecks from bigger football and basketball programs, but it can't.

Instead, Idaho State administrators hope they can redefine job descriptions and cut jobs without losing productivity. For the sake of their athletes, who spend months preparing to represent the university on the field of play, let's hope administrators learned something from the Holmesly affair.

Dan Thompson's column appears Thursdays. With comments or story ideas, call him at 239-3122 or e-mail dthompson@journalnet.com.

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