(The Center Square) – Wisconsin’s high school sports association doesn’t want to be subject to open meetings and public records laws, the subject of a legislative effort that has reached the governor’s desk and been vetoed multiple times.
The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association is concerned about being inundated with public records requests, especially in cases of transfer eligibility, Executive Director Stephanie Hauser said.
“I think we’re going to get pummeled with them,” Hauser said.
Hauser and WIAA officials pointed out that the organization is private and does not accept tax money.
But the group makes most of its funding from “host tournaments and through private donations,” according to Hauser and “subjecting a private organization to open records policies is akin to forcing a church, small business or any other sort of private organization to such policies.”
Many of those tournaments and the majority of teams competing in them are from public schools and teams.
Proponents of Senate Bill 16, however, say that the WIAA has a monopoly on high school sports in the state, giving public schools no other options, and the organization is selectively transparent when governing those schools, often leaving public schools, coaches, parents and students in the dark related to important decisions.
The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty advocated for the bill, saying the Legislature has never granted power over public school athletics to the WIAA.
“WIAA is a nominally private membership association that exercises governmental power by playing gatekeeper over interscholastic athletics, a government-provided benefit,” WILL wrote.
“The Department of Public Instruction even says WIAA is the ‘regulatory agency’ for interscholastic athletics.”
WILL said it believes the WIAA lacks transparency and meaningful oversight and it abuses that power.
But the WIAA noted in a letter against the bill that former Gov. Scott Walker vetoed a similar bill in 2015 and Gov. Tony Evers vetoed one in 2021.
“I am vetoing this bill in its entirety because I object to the legislature’s insertion into the decision-making process of a private, member-driven organization,” Evers wrote in his veto message.
