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The NCAA News -- April 26, 1999

I-AA football governance group acts on legislative proposals

The Division I-AA Football Governance Committee has approved and forwarded to the Division I Board of Directors a proposal that would eliminate annual preseason exempted contests after the 2002 playing season.

Proposal No. 98-90 permits Division I-AA institutions to schedule a 12th football contest in those years in which there are 14 Saturdays from the first permissible playing date through the last playing date in November.

The Board took no action on the proposal at its April 20 meeting, however, due to the lack of a quorum for Division I-AA members. The proposal will appear on the Board's agenda in August. If approved, the legislation would become effective beginning with the 2002 football season.

The proposal was one of several legislative actions the football governance committee took during its April 11 meeting in Newport Beach, California.

Another concerned Proposal No. 98-91, which would permit football student-athletes to participate in certain skill-related instruction outside the institution's declared playing season during the academic year.

The committee declined to approve the proposal for Division I-AA football players. Subsequent to that action, the Division I-A members of the Management Council approved the proposal and forwarded it to the Board of Directors, who unanimously defeated the proposal.

The committee did approve and forwarded to the Board Proposal No. 99-17, which would permit the Heritage Bowl to be conducted on the same weekend as the Division I-AA Football Championship, provided there is no conflict in the times of the contests. But because of the lack of a quorum for Division I-AA members, the Board took no action on the proposal and will review it in August.

The committee also reviewed a referral from the Championships/Competition Cabinet regarding whether oversight of the Heritage Bowl would be more appropriately placed with a Division I-AA committee and agreed that the Division I-AA Football Governance Committee would request and review the reports specified in Bylaw 30.9 for the Heritage Bowl.

Other legislative actions taken by the committee included tabling Proposal No. 98-54 regarding evaluations and telephone calls in Divisions I-A and I-AA football. The proposal also was tabled by the Division I-A members of the Management Council.

The committee also reviewed Proposal No. 98-122 regarding regional representation on sports committees with championship administration responsibilities and agreed to support the regional representation specified for the Division I-AA Football Committee. The full Management Council also approved the proposal and forwarded it to the Board.

In other action, the committee:

Agreed to give initial approval to Proposal No. 99-39, which would specify that a maximum of 105 student-athletes may participate in Division I-AA preseason football practice and noted that this proposal does not change the exception specified in Bylaw 17.10.2.1.2.1.

Agreed to request that the Management Council support legislation to amend Bylaw 21.6.6.3.3.2.1 to allow all Division I-AA conferences to select the individuals who serve as their representatives to the Football Issues Committee. (The Management Council subsequently gave initial approval to Proposal No. 99-43 as requested.)

Received a report from the chair of the Division I-AA Football Committee regarding that committee's evaluation of the Division I-AA Football Championship. Several issues were discussed regarding the television coverage of the championship and recent changes to the championship that were instituted for the "good of the game" but that reduced the revenue generated during the championship, including locating the championship game to a more neutral site, changing the bidding process for preliminary rounds and seeding all 16 teams.