League fee explanation…

If you have ever wondered how SLYSA league fees are set….read on.

Before we get too far, it should be noted that, for all intents and purposes, the league is self funded. This means the league gets no financial support from the city, county, state or corporations. The league receives some help from donations from individuals, groups and advertising, but, for the most part, all league operations are paid from league fees.

The SLYSA league fee is presented as a single fee and includes all game, administration and referee fees for a specified number of games (usually 10) for a single season. The fees are created to achieve two primary objectives: cover costs and include money for continued capital improvements.

While the league fee is presented as a single fee, internally the fee is composed of referee, administration, game, and capital improvement/contingency fees.

The referee portion of the league fee is paid to the referees after they referee a game. The referee fee is allocated on per game basis and is dependent upon the age group. For example, this year, a referee doing the middle for a U10 game receives $26 and one doing the middle for a high school game receives $44. This fee is a variable fee and is paid only if the game is played.

The administration portion of the fee is used to pay office administration and expenses. Game scheduling, referee assigning, accounting, field acquisition, awards, office supplies, office insurance, and general administration costs are covered by this portion of the league fee. While there are some variable costs, administrative costs are mostly fixed costs.

The game fee portion of the league fee is used to cover costs for the soccer complex, field rental, complex insurance, and debt reduction. The soccer complex costs include goals, nets, seed, fertilizer, pest control, disease control, lighting repairs, levee assessment, fuel, equipment maintenance, repairs, trash service, Johnny, parking lot repair, irrigation repair and general complex administration. Much of the game fee costs are fixed but also includes significant variable costs.

The capital improvement/contingency portion of the fee is set at the beginning of each year. Some of the capital improvements are required, but most of this fee is a variable cost.

So, now that we know the components that make up the fee, how are they set? The truth is that they are set with a lot of guess work guided by history. What will our fixed costs be? What are the referee fees? What improvements need to be made this year? What contingencies should we prepare for? And the most illusive and important question … how many teams will play in the league?

The referee portion of the fee is straightforward. The referee fee is set before the season begins and is simply passed through.

The fixed and variable costs for the administration and game fee portions are set based on past history and expected increases in costs (fuel for example). Any required capital improvements, if any, are added to the fixed costs. Optional capital improvements are included in the variable costs and are also available for contingencies.

We then guess at the number of teams expected to play in the league. We compute the total expected fixed and variable administration and game/complex costs for the year, add the referee fee portion, add the capital improvement target and divide the total sum by the number of teams expected to play that year. Voila! We have a league fee.



Before leaving the topic, there are a few other data points to keep in mind…

If you have ever wondered why dividing the league fee for a 10 game schedule by the number of games and dividing the league fee for an 11 game schedule (or any other number) does not give you the same per game number…here is why. The administration fee is based on each team not each game and the remaining fees are calculated on a per game basis. So, the league fee is calculated as follows: LeagueFee = ((number of games * (referee fee + game/capital improvement fee))) + admin fee.

The number of teams in the league has a significant impact on the league fees and the ability to do capital improvements.