By now you all have heard about the situation brewing between the North Mississippi Officials Association, Aberdeen High School, and Aberdeen Police Department.
If not, here it is in a nutshell.
Aberdeen police officers stopped a member of the officiating crew who worked the Bulldogs’ game against Houston this past Friday night as he was leaving the stadium. The police officers issued the official a ticket for reckless driving — a citation the official didn’t believe he should have received.
The official in question said there were no game management officials from the school to escort them off the field after the game, a reoccurring problem that has been backed up by numerous officials since the breaking of this story.
The North Mississippi Officials Association has since stated until a satisfactory resolution of the situation is met they will not assign any officials to the Aberdeen-Winona football game Friday night.
Brandon Speck of the Monroe Journal broke this story late last night.
To the NMOA the problem is not the ticket being issued, but the situation all together.
Larry Riley, the assigning secretary for the Northeast Mississippi Officials Association, feels the situation could have been avoided if the school would have followed protocol by assigning a school official to escort the officials from the field and to their vehicle like a vast majority of the schools do every Friday night after the game.
Reedell Holmes, Principal at Aberdeen High School, feels the officials’ association is attacking his school with no valid purpose other than wanting to get out of a ticket. He said that the school executed their plan to make sure the officials were taken care of before, during, and after the game stating to various sources that members of the Aberdeen Police Department escorted the officials to their vehicles after the game.
He went on to further defend his point by saying that once the officials step out of the stadium that they are no longer officials but citizens and the school can not be held responsible for mandating the actions of ordinary citizens.
Dr. Wendy McCollough, Athletic Director at Aberdeen HS, has yet to comment on the situation.
Other officials since have spoken out towards the remarks of Principal Holmes pointing out the school’s habitual tardiness on issuing game checks and speaking of numerous accounts of the lack of school assigned game management officials before or after games.
Some have gone as far to note that have made it adamant to the NMOA that they would never officiate another game at Aberdeen HS.
It’s unclear whether the lack of officials will result in a forfeit on Aberdeen’s record, but one official I spoke to today made it perfectly clear, “you can’t play without officials.”
The situation brings to the forefront a much larger underlying problem with the Aberdeen HS Athletic Department since the beginning of football season.
There have been many accounts of school officials “mishandling” minor situation and “ignoring” major situations according to people inside the athletic department and surrounding the program.
Minor situations being, a volunteer assistant coach not being permitted on the sidelines and made to sit in the stands due to not having a sideline pass despite school officials having full knowledge of his status with the football team. A coach being reprimanded in front of the players for a player’s stomach showing when a player removed his shoulder pads after a scrimmage before the start of the season.
Major situations being the current quagmire with the officials, where many feel that the school is “passing the buck” on to the police department to cover for their embarrassment and lack of “doing their job”.
It goes without saying this is another altercation in an already long list of mishaps that appears to have been easily avoided with the proper people in their proper place.
There are a lot of woeful individuals in the Aberdeen school system as they look ahead in anticipation of more headaches coming their way the deeper they get into the school year with basketball and baseball seasons far on the horizon.
Posted by Adam Gore 