| Camp ACC By Bill Topp, Referee associate editor __The business for Fred Barakat was officiating camps. It is no longer his business. Fueled by a series of in-depth exposés on Barakat’s camp business in the Raleigh (N.C.) News & Observer, new ACC commissioner John Swofford took swift action in his first week on the job. The ACC now runs the camp. There is no more “Inc.” tied to Barakat’s name. __On the surface, it appears the move is nothing more than a title change. In reality, it is among the most important conference decisions regarding the controversial camp industry. It may have far-reaching impact on the entire officiating camp business. It all comes down to one word: Perceptions. In the public eye __The News & Observer made Barakat’s camps a front-page story for the Sunday, June 8, 1997, edition. “I was shocked by the depth of the article,” says Barakat. The story examined the perception that to be hired, officials must pay to go to camps and then are obligated to teach at those same camps once they’re on the conference staff. Referees who don’t like the system liken it to extortion. __Supervisors in all conferences justify the camps with a legitimate concern: They must see a referee work before they can make a hiring decision, something they’re stretched too thin to do during the regular season. Most supervisors also stress that their camp is a “teaching” camp and that if you’ve come to their camp simply to get hired, you’re there for the wrong reason. __Officials’ perceptions create reality: Referees know they must go to camp to get games. They’ll often do what it takes — like go to the same camp many times over. __Why go through it? An ACC roster spot is among the most treasured rewards in officiating. The chosen few are blessed with outstanding games, big-time game checks (including the travel allowance, checks often exceed $1,000) and the ego-stroke that comes from being the envy of thousands of refs nationwide. The arguments and emotions drew the interest of the News & Observer. __Barakat, who is also supervisor of officials for the Big South and Colonial Athletic Association, was directly involved with three camps. He ran his own in Pittsburgh and coordinated two others with John Guthrie, the supervisor of officials for the Southeastern Conference (SEC), in Las Vegas and Indianapolis. Roughly 50 officials attended Barakat’s Pittsburgh camp annually, each paying $475 for the privilege. The Barakat-Guthrie camps cost $400 and were limited to 80 campers. The News & Observer said Barakat and Guthrie were also paid a total of $10,000 annually by Nike and adidas to provide referees for invitational player camps in Indianapolis and Las Vegas that were run in conjunction with the officiating camps. Based on those figures, Barakat grossed about $60,000 yearly from the camps in addition to his ACC salary which reportedly was $103,010 in 1996. __In the story, veteran referee Rusty Herring said, “I’ve always felt it was a conflict of interest.” Herring, a former ACC official who now works in the Big East, SEC and other conferences, left the ACC in 1993. He said he worked as a clinician at several of Barakat’s camps because he thought if he didn’t, Barakat would not assign him a full schedule of games. “I was not paid,” he said. “It was an understood thing that you had to work the camps to receive a schedule.” __Barakat disagrees with anyone who says they had to attend or teach at his camp to work for him, though he acknowledges that there was a perception problem. __The timing of the article still rankles Barakat. The story was published soon after the ACC named John Swofford its new commissioner, replacing longtime commissioner Gene Corrigan. Barakat says, “Somebody is out there to get me, I think, and took an opportunity to cause me enough problems to maybe diminish my responsibilities, have me lose my camp or even maybe have me released from my position. I don’t know for sure.” He says he thinks the timing of the article with Swofford’s hiring was “purposely done.” The backstory __Although the 58-year-old Barakat was never an official, he was charged with improving the league’s officiating when the ACC hired him 18 years ago. “There were a lot of officials on the roster who really should have been removed,” he says. “It was in my job description to clean it up. I had a tough job. Anytime you’ve got to let officials go, you’re going to be the bad guy.” __The league wanted Barakat to find new officials. He had camp experience as a former coach so he brought the camp concept into officiating. __Swofford and Barakat both say that in the beginning, Barakat wanted the camp to be an ACC camp, not a Fred Barakat camp. __“They said, ‘No. We don’t want to get into the camp business. You do it,’” says Barakat. __He immediately set about figuring what it would cost to run a camp. “I built a price in there so that I could make some money on it as a private enterprise,” he says. “This is America, a democracy, and I thought I had the right to make money. I was providing a service. __“I think most campers will tell you that it’s been a wonderful experience. But the official who’s been going to a lot of camps and hasn’t been picked up, he’s going to feel he’s been exploited.” __Barakat adds, “almost 90 percent” of the officials on his rosters were identified through his camps. __Barakat also created what he calls “an in-service training camp” for the officials who were already on the league’s roster. At his camps, Barakat says referee evaluations and instructional meetings took place for those already on staff. When asked about the perception of having to attend the camp to maintain a schedule, Barakat replied, “No one said they didn’t want to do it. If you couldn’t make it (because of family or work, etc.) we’d deal with it. __“The in-service also gave the referees an opportunity to show coaches they were working on officiating in the summer months. That was positive. A lot of coaches felt referees take their shoes off after the season and don’t look at a basketball until the fall. We started getting some very positive feedback from coaches all over the country because they saw ACC guys out working camps. Referees take time from their work and are out teaching young officials. It was a positive thing.” __In the beginning Barakat paid his clinicians. “As the years went on,” he says, “A lot of them said, ‘Look. We don’t need any money. You do so much for us, we don’t need any money.’” Barakat said he paid for his clinicians’ travel expenses and room and board and “took care of them” by taking them out to dinner and paid for rounds of golf. “I was doing all that stuff and more,” he says. “I wasn’t actually giving them a fee, but I know in my heart I was paying them.” __The entire current ACC officiating staff wrote Barakat a letter of support after the newspaper articles hit. Ten-year ACC referee Mike Wood said in the News & Observer article that he was not paid to work at the camps, but, “Essentially I was donating my services, giving something back to the game. You reap what you sow.” He added, “I’m a product of the system. I came through the camps and I worked conference games pretty quickly.” Wood told Referee, “Without the instruction at the camps, I wouldn’t be where I’m at now.” Camp ACC __Because of the timing of the News & Observer articles, the camp issue was among the first items new commissioner Swofford had to deal with. He said, “After evaluating and talking to a number of people, my conclusion was that nothing inappropriate had been done at all. In fact, Fred had actually done what he was asked to do. But I also felt there was a better way to structure it.” After talking it over with Barakat, faculty representatives, athletic directors and the conference executive committee, Swofford recommended the camps fall totally under the purview of the ACC. __Swofford says that by so doing, the league has removed the conflict of interest issue. Barakat’s compensation for his involvement in the camp is now a part of his overall salary and is not directly related to camp revenues. “I think it’s been handled in a way that Fred is very comfortable with,” Swofford says. “I’m comfortable with it. The entire conference is comfortable with it.” __Barakat adds, “(The ACC) compensated me to a point where I’m extremely pleased and agreeable to it. It’s more than fair.” __The new structure for the ACC-run camp is very different. Barakat has been charged with formulating the budget for the camp, which will be paid entirely by the ACC. He will attend other camps and identify 30 officials who will be invited to the ACC-sponsored camp in Indianapolis, still run in conjunction with the Nike players’ camp. Many of those 30 invitees are officials who have already attended Barakat’s camps. __The ACC will pay the room and board for the invitation-only participants. “The only thing that the official has to pay for is transportation to get there,” says Barakat. “He’ll get the same instruction he’s always had.” __Guthrie told Referee that the SEC will also participate in the Indianapolis camp and bring in 30 other officials, paid for by the SEC. Guthrie will continue to operate his for-profit camp in Las Vegas, but without Barakat. The Pittsburgh camp solely owned by Barakat is no longer in operation. __“This is big business,” said Barakat. “There’s a lot of money involved here. We pay a lot of money to officials to work games. It’s a huge commitment.” What’s next? __Barakat was one of the first to offer a camp in the early ’80s and, because of a trickle-down effect, it had a giant impact on the way officiating business is done today. Camps are now run at all levels, including those coordinated by NCAA Division III conference supervisors. In some areas, camps are coordinated by individuals identifying and hiring high school varsity refs. Could the ACC’s new stance on eliminating a bad perception have the same trickle down effect? __Swofford, a visionary personality, would like to see the entire officiating assignment process changed to help eliminate many perception problems. “I think we need to go toward regionalizing officials and get a more national scope. We should get away from labeling a certain ref with a specific conference. What we need is a college officiating crew — an NCAA crew — and stop calling them ‘an ACC crew’ or ‘an SEC crew.’ We need to have more cooperation with the conferences to get there. The labels aren’t good for officials and they’re not good for the game. … A number of people fundamentally support the idea and I’ve gotten a very positive response. How we get there, I’m not sure yet. … If there’s some added cost to do what we think is best for the game, then so be it. It’s a worthy investment in my mind.” __The NCAA may at some point take a closer look at the camp business. In the News & Observer article, Terry Holland, athletic director at Virginia, an ACC school, and head of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Committee said, “In the old days, the conferences weren’t willing to sponsor camps and individuals had to start them. They would not exist without entrepreneurial spirit. But I can see where there can be potential for abuse. If the conference were running the camp, there would be no possibility of a conflict of interest. It’s something worth discussing, especially if we feel there is abuse.” __Hank Nichols, the NCAA coordinator of men’s basketball officiating, says, “There’s probably a lot of merit to the idea of having some overall supervision through the NCAA. Camps are good for guys wanting to get into the business and learn the basics. But after a point, after they’ve gone through the summer camp routine a couple of times, you have to be careful not to keep accepting guys just to make money.” __In the meantime, Fred Barakat moves forward with no camp to his name. Make no mistake, he’s still the most powerful man in ACC officiating. “As far as I’m concerned,” he says, “there was no integrity issue, there was no morality issue, there were no legal issues. It was a perception issue only. And it wasn’t going to go away. … It doesn’t matter whether it’s right or wrong. To me, it was right. But someone thinks it’s wrong. I’m a part of the solution and it’s a good one. __“I have the respect of the people who pay me. That’s the most important thing to me.” |
| Who’s next? There are other conferences that are not involved in camps and have their supervisors handle the business. Their operational structure is similar to the now-defunct Barakat camps. John Guthrie, supervisor of officials for the SEC, and Dale Kelley, officiating coordinator for Conference USA, the Big 12, and Sun Belt conferences, are among the most high-profile supervisors who run their own camps without conference affiliation. The Big 10, Big East and Pac-10 conferences run their own camps. The Big East holds one invitation-only camp that is paid for by the league. There is no charge to the officials who attend. “Our camp is not a profit center,” said Art Hyland, the Big East coordinator of officials. “We have lost money on the camp. The conference considers it an investment. It’s an investment in the future.” The Big 10 does not allow officials’ supervisor Rich Falk to run a for-profit camp. The league operates the camp. Falk said 60 attendees pay $300 each for the camp. Clinicians receive $100 a day, with any profits used for the league programs. “It is not an entrepreneurial, individually run enterprise,” said Falk. “This is a Big 10 enterprise, not a Rich Falk enterprise.” |
| The News & Observer Replies … Raleigh News & Observer sports editor Steve Riley takes issue when Fred Barakat says that the series of articles the paper published regarding Barakat’s camps were timed to coincide with John Swofford being hired as the new ACC commissioner. “We attempted to do the story around the time of the ACC tournament (March 1997),” says Riley. “We wanted to do it then because of the increased public interest in ACC basketball. We just couldn’t get it together in time. “We were being very careful,” he continues. “We didn’t want to publish it until it was ready, but we didn’t want to hold it for six months either. We really wanted to do it when basketball season was at its peak; that’s just sound journalism.” Ultimately the story ran in June 1997. When asked where the idea to investigate the story initially came from, Riley responded, “There have been rumors and darkened whispers about this stuff for a long time. We finally decided to investigate it.” Riley went on to say that because of the nature of the story and because of the lack of officiating knowledge at the paper, everything had to be researched extremely thoroughly. Staff writer Chip Alexander and Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Pat Stith wrote the initial story. The decision to run the finished story on the front page was made by a group of editors at the paper who routinely decide front-page placement. “There is a lot of reporting that goes into something like this,” says Riley. “We don’t publish a story like that lightly.” |
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