Ethical Dilemma: Pay for Play

For years, your local community has offered a variety of sport and recreation options to children in the area. As the Director of Community Sport, you oversee recruiting players, coaches, and officials to participate in soccer, hockey, golf, field hockey, lacrosse, football, cheerleading, baseball, and softball. Participants range from age 3 to 18, and sport in the community has become a local mainstay on weeknights and weekends.

Since 2000, the fee to participate in the sport and recreation options has been $10. Most of the funding for the community sports has come from a town board allocation. However, at a recent town board meeting, it was decided that the budget would be reduced by one-third, as the town is now grappling with a deficit and inflation. It was left to you to decide how best to proceed with a limited budget.

For inspiration, you looked to the neighboring town that has a pay-for-play system in place for youth sport participation. Depending on the sport, the cost to participate ranges from $100 per season (soccer) to $1,500 per season (ice hockey). After instituting the change, the neighboring town had a decrease in the number of participants (around 40%), but an increase in the competitive success of the teams, with several youth teams making it to regional- and state-level competitions. However, the neighboring town has a median household income of $84,000, while your community has a median household income of $48,000. You are concerned that a similar price structure would devastate your community and price out many families from participation.

Working with your assistant director, you attempt to come up with a plan to account for the budget gap while also taking into consideration the large number of sport offerings and the discretionary income in the area. To make this important decision, which has immense ramifications for your community's youth, you decide to examine the organization's mission statement and apply an ethical decision-making model to the dilemma. Your current mission statement reads, "We strive to provide athletic and social opportunities to all children in the community in a safe, productive, and healthy environment."

Questions for Discussion

1. Select one of the ethical decision-making models outlined in the chapter (or another popular model not included in the chapter). Work through the dilemma using the stepwise progression of the model and consider each individual step.
2. From this model, what decision would you select in helping your community overcome this dilemma?
3. With the recent budget changes and your solution implementation, is the mission statement in need of updating?
   1. If yes, select a new mission statement.
   2. If no, how does your solution still meet the original mission statement?