The Division II Budget and Finance Committee has recommended a goal amount for the Division II membership reserve fund.

At its March 3 meeting, the committee voted to recommend to the Division II Management Council that, beginning in the 2000-01 fiscal year, the division's membership trust be equal to 30 percent of the division's operating revenue in any given year. The current policy places, at a minimum, 5 percent of the annual Division II allocation and a minimum of 5 percent of any applicable surpluses from the previous year in a Division II membership reserve.

The preliminary budgeted Division II revenue for 2000-01 is $13.55 million, which would call for a membership reserve of $4.06 million (30 percent). The membership reserve is budgeted to contain about $2.03 million by August 31, 2000, so the Budget and Finance Committee is recommending that approximately $2 million in current unallocated funds be used to bring the reserve to the 30 percent level in 2000-01.

The membership reserve is a "rainy day fund" that would fund Division II activities, primarily championships, for a year in the event of some sort of unforeseen expenses.

As revenues increase annually (Division II gets 4.37 percent of NCAA operating revenues), contributions to the membership reserve also would increase. In most cases, the increase will be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, but in 2002-03 -- the first year of the new CBS contract -- the division would need to contribute an additional $1 million to keep the fund at 30 percent. Of course, the division's overall allocation will be commensurately larger because of the larger rights payment from CBS.

In other business, the Budget and Finance Committee agreed that funding is available for $961,250 in initiatives proposed by Division II committees and staff. All but $74,000 of the new initiatives relate to recommendations from the Championships Committee. Most of the Championships Committee requests involve expenses related to bracket expansions, increase in field sizes and increases in travel parties in selected sports (see the January 31 issue of The NCAA News).

The Budget and Finance Committee report is a verification that money for the initiatives is available. The initiatives still must be approved by the Management and Presidents Councils.

Another topic of interest involved possible uses of CBS bonus money and additional Division II unallocated funds. Division II's share of CBS's one-time $40 million bonus payment is $1.75 million, and the current actual Division II unallocated funds will stand at $1.1 million if the additional membership reserve allotment is approved. The committee recommended that the division's governance bodies decide how to seek input from the membership on the best use of this non-reoccurring money.