2006: Mayor: Let’s use tax dollars to revive football program

Mayor Carlos Mayans started a campaign to bring football back to Wichita State University on Friday by giving the school’s president a seven-page summary of how he thinks it could work.

After a 90-minute meeting, WSU president Don Beggs said he would consider Mayans’ plan, but remains skeptical because it would invest public money in what he thinks is a risky endeavor.

“I’m personally very uncomfortable with using taxpayer money for a new athletic program,” Beggs said.

No cost estimates are available, but in 1997 a consultant’s report estimated that operating a football program - and three new women’s sports - at WSU would cost $11 million over five years.

To raise money, Mayans wants WSU to take a portion of the $6 million in property tax money it receives and set it aside for athletic scholarships. He also wants to sell 17,000 tickets in advance at $150 each and attract $10 million in donations from athletic boosters.

To comply with federal law requiring equivalent scholarship opportunities for female athletes, Mayans said, the university should also start a women’s soccer team.

Benefits of football

To Mayans, reviving Division I-A college football could boost WSU’s enrollment, diversify the student population and give the community a sense of pride.

WSU’s enrollment has declined by nearly 3,000 students since 1987, the first year WSU had no football team. That decline, Mayans claims, has cost the city $144 million.

University officials say declining enrollment relates to the area’s economy, not the lack of football.

There is mixed evidence of whether sports can boost enrollment.

A 2003 study commissioned by the NCAA found that successful athletic programs can increase enrollment and that dropping football can lead to lower enrollment.

Other studies find that sports programs don’t necessarily draw more students.

“Just starting a football program likely isn’t going to be enough to make a considerable difference in admissions,” said Chad McEvoy, an assistant professor of sports management at Illinois State University. He has spent more than five years studying the relationship between sports and enrollment.

“Not only are they going to need the team, they’re going to need a successful team to see any tangible effect,” he said.

It may make more sense to spend tax dollars on academic-based scholarships, McEvoy said.

“That would sure seem to be a perhaps more sound investment,” he said.

An enduring dilemma

Shocker football has been a recurring question since WSU dropped the program in December 1986, citing community apathy and a growing debt in the athletic department. School officials said the program lost $839,000 during the 1986 season, when it averaged less than 10,000 fans per game.

Fred Marrs, an attorney who has pushed for a new football program for years and written several in-depth studies on the topic, said while WSU lost students, Kansas State University began to gain them.

Mayans also cites that comparison, noting that K-State enrollment has climbed by nearly 7,000 while WSU’s has slumped. K-State, after years of football futility, became a national power in the 1990s.

When WSU last examined the idea in 1998, an athletic committee voted 14-3 in favor of reinstating football. But the committee said the program should not begin until sufficient funds are raised.

George Fahnestock, a Shocker booster who was part of a 1997 task force asked to study football’s return, said the university should proceed with caution.

“It can’t be a drain on all the other sports, ‘’ he said. “It can’t put the athletic department in jeopardy.

“It’s pretty simple: If there’s funding I think it makes some sense.”

The City Council’s role

Other members of the City Council don’t want to meddle with how WSU chooses to spend its share of the mill levy.

Nonetheless, it could become a council issue if Mayans pushes for a vote on whether the city should tell WSU how to spend its contingency fund. The university sets aside about $680,000 out of its $6 million share of property taxes for a contingency fund. Most of the money in that fund is used for scholarships, Beggs said.

Council members Bob Martz and Carl Brewer both said that starting a football program should be up to WSU, not the City Council.

“As long as they want to have an academic school that’s their choice,” Martz said in a meeting when Mayans first explained his idea to the council. “I personally do not think it’s our place to take an active role in trying to shove football down WSU’s throat.”

Mayans said he would share information with the council but keep his efforts to revive football separate.

“At the end of the day, if the president doesn’t want to do it, it isn’t going to happen because it’s his university and we do not have the right to tell him what to do there,” he said.

This story was originally published December 10, 2015 at 12:37 PM with the headline "2006: Mayor: Let’s use tax dollars to revive football program."