Proposed bill could add funding to high school athletics

Traditional public high schools and charter high schools could soon benefit with additional funds for high school athletics if one state legislator has his way in Tallahassee during the legislative session which starts in March.

Bruce Antone-D, who represents Florida House of Representatives 46th District in the Orlando area has proposed a 25 cent surcharge fee be added to the tickets of any professional sports tickets sold in the state. The fee itself could provide a boost to high school athletics in the state at a time when athletic departments have seen a cuts in the funding it gets in the overall school budget.

The bill specifically states that the funds collected will be proportionally divided among school districts based on the number of traditional public high schools with interscholastic programs while within each school district that receives funds, the funds shall further be divided among all traditional and charter high schools.

The bill will have to advance through several committee’s to receive a final vote, something that is not guaranteed at all.

INSTANT INSIGHT: This bill has the potential to provide some much-needed revenue for public schools and charter schools who have had to divert funds away from funding athletics. In some parts of the state, travel funds for teams to travel have been slashed, travel restrictions be set in place or even in one county having the amount of regular season games be reduced. While some of the cuts and restrictions took place at the start of the Great Recession back in late 2008-early 2009, some areas still haven’t budge to restore things yet to levels previously seen. If this bill was to pass, the amount of money seen by each of the public schools, public lab schools and charter schools could be in excess of the $5,000 level each year, but also depending on if other sports deemed as professional have the surcharge fee added on to the price of tickets. Below is a chart with the help of Dallas Jackson from NationalHSFootball.com, showing just the potential revenue impact that a 25 cent fee surcharge per ticket could have on high school sports in Florida. You can also vote in our poll asking if you would support the 25 cent fee surcharge for professional sports tickets as well as discuss it on our message boards here.

POLL

REVENUE BREAKDOWN

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