United States Office of Sports and Fitness?
In response to the Wall Street Journal article, “Olympic Commission Wants to Put the U.S. Government in Charge of Youth Sports” (subscribed), U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas wrote on his Facebook page, “The government running your kid’s little league.. what could go wrong?”
Olympic Commission?? Senator referred to the Commission on the State of U.S. Olympics and Paralympics (CSUSOP), which was created by Empowering Olympic, Paralympic, and Amateur Athletes Act of 2020 to study the United States's participation in the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Last Friday, the CSUSOP submitted the 277-page Final Report to Congress.
As the CSUSOP’s fiscal agent, the Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program pushed the CSUSOP to focus on youth sports. The Aspen Institute has tried Congress to re-introduce H.R 8552 (PLAYS in Youth Sports Act), which would authorize $75 million in grant funding to go directly to youth sports non-profits.
Read my previous newsletter issue, “CSUSOP Is The Aspen Institute Sports & Society Program's Pet Project????”
Last night, I re-subscribed to the Wall Street Journal and read the above article, written by Louise Radnofsky and Rachel Bachman, and over 110 comments.
On March 4, the Editorial Board of the Wall Street Journal launched an opinion, “A Tax Deduction for Little League? (subscribed)” The Board exclaimed, “The U.S. doesn’t need a new federal agency to micromanage youth sports in the name of ‘equity.’’’
Since most of you are not WSJ subscribers, I am adding more lines based on this opinion.
The CSUSOP Report “isn’t limited to improving athlete safety. It recommends an overhaul of youth athletic development to improve “equity.”
One commenter wrote, “Not only no but also hell no. Keep the Federal Government out of the kid sports. The Federal Government will simply screw up whatever they touch.”
The CSUSOP Report “proposes a new Office of Sports and and Fitness that would be in charge of “coorinating and developing youth and grassroots sports.”. The Board has wondered if we “really need bureaucrats micromanaging coaches?”
“The downfall of youth sports. Our government can't even pass a budget, protect our borders or educate our children and some fool thinks we should hand over youth sports...give me a break!” wrote another commenter.
The Board points that the CSUSOP “recommends new tax deducations for coaching out of pocket expenses and course-enrollment fees, including for parent volunteers.”
“Because the Department of Education is so successful? Let me guess: the teacher's union will unionize coaches. Playoffs, competitions, and individual trophies will be eliminated, and all athletes will be subjected to DEI propaganda,” exclaimed another commenter.
The CSUSOP Report says that Congress “should let parents deduct youth sports “program fees, the cost of necessary equipment, and funds spent on travel for competition.”
Another commenter paused, “Let the government take over everything - sports, scouting, churches, school boards, libraries, arcades, amusement parks, books, healthcare.”
In conclusion, the Board states that “taxpayers would subsidize affluent parents who enroll their children in elite club sports. And this is supposed to improve equity? It isn’t clear what problem the Commission is trying to solve. Many of America’s top athletes haven’t hailed from wealth. The Williams sisters were famously taught tennis by their father at a park in Compton [California].”
The last sentence of the Board opinion reads, “A new federal bureaucracy will make it worse.”
Will the United States Office of Sports and Fitness benefit the athletes who are deaf and hard of hearing?
I have no comment since the USA Deaf Sports Federation (USADSF) has not yet released the official statement on the response to the CSUSOP Final Report.
NOTE: I am not writing this issue as a USADSF official but as a former USOC-appointed delegate to the USOC Committee of Handicapped in Sports (1978-80).
Naturally, past and present USA Deaflympians are very disappointed that the CSUSOP has not recommended that Congress should amend the Deaflympics into the Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act to recognize the Deaflympics since an athlete who is deaf and hard of hearing is “an individual is disabled within the meaning of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 if he or she has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities. (Americans with Disabilities Act, 42 U.S.C. § 12102(1))” by CSUSOP Co-Chair Dionne Koller’s work, “The Increasing Role of Disability Issues in U.S. Sports Law.”
However, the CSUSOP has a micro-small recommendation for the Deaflympians. Please read it in the below picture.
However, the Deaflympians are not giving up, so we will march toward the U.S. Capitol to lobby federal legislators.
