As the ultimate decision-making body in the Division I enforcement process, the Committee on Infractions demands a roster of members that is diverse in thought and background as well as gender and ethnicity. This fall, three people will be leaving the committee, and current members hope that their replacements will provide the kind of balance the group needs to function both efficiently and fairly.

Departing are Colonial Athletic Association Commissioner Tom Yeager, a former NCAA enforcement staffer and committee member since 1997; former Kentucky appellate judge James Park Jr., an attorney who also joined the committee in 1997; and Andrea Myers, athletics director at Indiana State University. Myers, who joined the committee in 2001, is retiring.

Infractions committee members are appointed by the Division I Management Council. Of the 10 members, seven are on the staff of member institutions or conferences and three are representatives of the general public. Only eight of the members are full voting members; the other two process appeals on behalf of the committee. Each member serves a maximum of three three-year terms. Park fills one of the public member spots on the committee.

The Division I Committee on Infractions is one of the most high-profile NCAA committees, but potential members seeking the limelight must also be prepared for an unparalleled workload, many current members said. The committee tries to schedule six weekend meetings per year (though they met eight times in the last year), and the meetings are very labor intensive.

However, members caution that meetings are just a small part of the actual workload — extensive preparation for each meeting is necessary, and follow-up work also is important. The committee often has teleconferences between regularly scheduled hearings as well. The volume of materials that must be reviewed before each meeting is sizeable.

“There is no way to overstate the amount of work this committee takes on. We have people come from other very busy committees and will say it is nothing like (the committee on infractions),” said vice chair Josephine Potuto, law professor at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. “It is not uncommon to need 50 to 60 hours to get ready for a hearing weekend.”

The nature of the work also is a factor, Yeager said, because many enforcement cases have potentially severe penalties for those appearing before the committee.

“It is very high-stakes work. You’re dealing with potential consequences for institutions, careers of individuals and legal considerations at every turn,” Yeager said. “There are a lot of people who from a distance are intrigued by the idea of serving, but the challenge is really getting very qualified people who also can put in the time and attention that the service deserves.”

Another challenge is creating diversity on the committee. Committee Chair Gene Marsh, a law professor at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, said committee members must be diverse in ethnicity and gender — and in background.

“We need diversity in every sense of the word,” he said. “When people come into that committee, they like to look up at the front of the room and see folks who they know deal with the difficult job of running a large athletics program, keeping boosters under control and making sure everyone in the department is doing their best to stay within the limits. In order to have not only integrity but also believability, the people who come in front of the committee need to see people that they know actually struggle with this stuff when they’re back working on campus.”

Potuto said a degree of life experience is necessary for a committee member to be effective.

“The way I summarize this part of it is that you need to be fairly old. You really do,” she said. “Judgment comes from living through experiences. There are very bright, capable and knowledgeable people, but if you have all that, and you also have someone who has been through things and knows the challenges and has the responsibility to deal with problems, that’s the extra edge that I think is really important.”

Committee members also believe the type of life experience also is important. They want the committee to be fairly balanced in terms of background — the public members often are attorneys and former judges (like Park and the other public member, Alfred “Jim” Lechner Jr.). The remaining slots are filled by people from member conferences and institutions, and members want to be sure that both academics and athletics are represented.

Marsh stressed that while a legal background helps the members from the Association, practical experience  and “good common sense” also are necessary to provide not only empathy with those who appear before the committee, but also to give the group credibility.

“You need to have some people who have some experience with their feet on the ground in dealing with the programs,” he said. “People need to understand first the workload and the time commitment that’s involved, but secondly, the importance of hands-on experience so we don’t become just a group of lawyers or a group of faculty members.”

Replacing the expertise and experience that will leave the committee, especially with the departures of longtime members Yeager and Park, Potuto said, will be difficult, but she hopes the new members have similar strengths and backgrounds.

Ideally, at least one of the incoming members would have experience in both athletics and law, said Shep Cooper, director of the NCAA infractions committees. For example, Paul Dee, athletics director at the University of Miami (Florida), was that institution’s general counsel before becoming athletics director — though Dee may be a unique case. A person with both a legal and an athletics background would be trained in legal processes and would know how to analyze information, and he or she also would be aware of the challenges of running an athletics department, Cooper said.

Hands-on experience provides fairness to the process for both the schools that appear before the committee as well as those that aren’t accused of violations but rely on the members to provide fair and accurate assessments and penalties for their peers. For example, Potuto said, a penalty that might appear severe to her could be very minor in application. Someone with an athletics background could point that out to her, she said. Similarly, a penalty that seems minor to her could have more far-reaching consequences than she anticipated.

“Institutions, coaches, directors of athletics — they deserve to have people on the committee who understand that world, work in it and know what the pressures are,” she said. “On the other hand, the rest of the schools who are not appearing before the committee deserve to have people on the committee who are savvy about this stuff. On both ends, it’s absolutely critical.”

Nominations for the membership replacements were due December 9. The committee members will forward their recommendations for the public-member replacement to the Management Council. The Council will make final selections of new members at its April meeting.