Football Playoffs and LHSAA Face Legislative Scrutiny

Football Playoffs and LHSAA Face Legislative Scrutiny

In a divisive move last January, the LHSAA voted for separate football playoffs for public and private schools dismantling a 90 year old playoff system.  The expressed reason for the separate playoff system is to balance a perceived competitive advantage in favor of private schools that have the ability to "recruit” top players.  However, the LHSAA action lumped university laboratory schools such as Baton Rouge’s University High and Southern University Lab Schools into the private school category.  Both schools are public although each has some characteristics of a private school.  The legislative review may be enough to force a reconsideration of the issue by LHSAA.  If not, legislative action, in the form of a new bill, is possible as is legal action, likely based upon Federal and State Equal Protection violations.

This is not the first time the LHSAA has faced legislative and judicial review.  A 2010 lawsuit by LHSAA officials resulted in a Louisiana Supreme Court ruling declaring the organization a private firm as opposed to an agency or arm of the State of Louisiana.  This judicial designation may protect the recent LHSAA decision on football playoffs from legal attack.  But the designation as a private firm carries other effects include the prospect that LHSAA officials will no longer qualify for inclusion in state retirement and benefit programs.  With nearly a year before the next football playoffs and legislative and judicial review in the works, we are likely to see a final resolution of this contentious issue by Fall.