Suffolk's Cinelli Discusses Fewer High School Championships

Story reprinted from Newsday High School Sports, March 18th

Suffolk County's top high school sports official has introduced the idea of eliminating or curtailing state championships because of the high cost of participation.

"We love the state championships, but financially it's a burden," Section XI executive director Ed Cinelli said. "That's the reason we want to discuss this. For the 2011-12 school year, there is not a single state championship on Long Island. We're traveling for everything. There's a huge cost to that. We'd like to bring some events down here."

School districts, which help support Sections VIII and XI -- the governing bodies for sports in Nassau and Suffolk respectively -- through dues, are under tremendous financial pressure, struggling with the fallout from reduced state aid, staff layoffs, escalating pension costs and staying within the mandated 2 percent cap on property tax increases.

Cinelli said it cost Section XI more than $200,000 in travel expenses for the 2010-11 school year to send Suffolk teams or individual athletes to state championships. The New [lacrosse] State Public High Schools Athletic Association reimburses each of the state's 11 sections for some transportation costs for state tournaments, but not for all travel costs.

The remainder of the article is available at Newsday's web site.