The organizations Rutgers Athletics has been lying to, the NCAA and the Big Ten.
‘Unsustainable’: How Rutgers athletics quietly racked up $265M in debt
- Thread starter Tango Two
- Start date
It was. As it was the case with Barnabas and Rodkin buildings. The writers are trying to weave a big conspiracy together. They admit there is no set uniform reporting methodology for the NCAA reporting, that every school does it differently, they purposely blur the lines between University funding and loans to make things look worse, Holloway is quoted in the piece as saying he is considering just forgiving the loans as well as saying we don't have a budget problem, we have a revenue problem. Football revenues dropped every year during the Ash error and then the pandemic happened. At least they admit that.
I've been watching Rutgers for years and not sure I have thought about it's finances even once other than to think we're probably behind our current athletics peers because of our relatively short history as a State U. The statement the admin released seems completely reasonable to me TBH.
Oh, stop. They're misrepresenting the school covering the budget deficits as loans. So if I take money out of my savings account to cover a check in my checking account, did I give my checking account a loan? No, I moved money from one account to another.
Anyway, here's a link that as of yesterday did not have a paywall.
https://www.buckeyextra.com/in-dept...t-borrows-to-keep-pace-in-big-ten/8047865002/
I don't have access to the article. How much of the debt is external or linked directly to institutional savings/endowments that would otherwise be earning interest. I always thought that the previous president used the notion of "internal debt" as a budgeting gimmick to temporarily allow the athletic department to spend more than it brought in (until we started earning a full B1G share). If the money came from the general fund annually and wasn't linked to external obligations (or savings/endowments), is it really an issue? In other words, if the president waived the magic wand and made the "debt" disappear, would the institution owe someone, or would its savings/endowments take a hit?
Gannett NJ has turned into a terrible sensationalist rag. So many lame attempts at hard-hitting investigative reports.
yawn - the annual piece from a liberal rag that RU spends too much money on sports article. These articles have been recycled for 40 years. Getting very old. and behind a paywall about 5 people read this. Move on.
Lol. Penn state let the raping of little boys happen and sanctions didn’t really even happen there . But rutgers is gonna get sanctioned for some accounting?? You’re a fool
the guy has five posts on this site. All of them are on this thread. It's either Killingsworth or one of the people that wrote the hit piece LOL
For those new to the discussion, we topped this list in 2015, and Barchi needed a way to continue paying the bills, but he didn't want the bad press. The article even suggests that the university is considering wiping the "internal" debt because it really wasn't debt... it was a subsidy. Turning the subsidy into revenue from an "internal loan" took us off the top of the subsidy list. I have no idea if Barchi's creative accounting was legit. If the loans are bogus, then the total debt number can't be correct either. Once we start getting a full B1G share, things should come back into alignment... However, COVID and eating the contracts of bad hires continue to run-up the annual costs.
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Don't forget the game day revenue lost during the last couple years of the bad hires
Five posts or 50,000, I can still recognize mismanagement when I see it and Rutgers is a leader in mismanagement. I must say it is fun to bring facts to this sight and read the mental gymnastics so many of you perform to try and alter the truth.
Definitely the writer of the article or part of the Rutgers1000 but really Rutgers100.
How are you qualified to recognize mismanagement? And in what particular fields? What expertise do you have in athletics finance that qualifies you go recognize and opine on whether mismanagement has occurred? Nobody is doing any mental gymnastics in this thread or trying to alter the truth. If anything Pat Hobbs and Pres. Holloway were fully transparent and forthcoming with the writers of the article.
Site. This is a site. Your grammar makes me suspect you are a Newhouse grad.
If you want to come on here on proclaim all this wisdom, are you also willing to disclose a bit about your background? Are you involved at all in the research of this article? Where are your interests vested?
Rutgers needs to cut a number of sports. It’s really that simple.
Other sites on the rival’s network ban trolls without hesitation. Why not us?
There's not much room to cut. We have to have at least the NCAA minimum requirement.
Taxpayer money is being used to operate the mess that is Rutgers Athletics. That’s my interest. You should all be concerned. Since none of you seem to have read the piece regarding athletic’s spending, here’s the lead. Please note that is President Holloway who call the financial situation “unsustainable.”
"It's unsustainable, but I don't have an answer as to what
is the sustainable piece going forward."
Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway
Speaking of the practice of borrowing more to pay off existing athletic department loans This was the year University Athletics expected to be on firm financial ground.
Instead, the athletic division has been losing more money than ever. And almost half of its $265million in outstanding debt has not gone toward new buildings -- it has instead been used solely to cover the ever-rising operating costs associated with joining the Big Ten Conference.
The university has stepped in, loaning athletics $84million over the last six years just to cover expenses -- violating its own policy, which it changed after inquiries from T he Record and NorthJersey.com.
Rutgers has been reporting those loans as revenue -- contrary to NCAA guidelines -- artificially inflating the athletic department's earnings and concealing the true budget deficit from the students, their parents and taxpayers who pay the bills, a monthslong analysis of Rutgers financial documents by The Record and NorthJersey.com has found.
Much about athletics is cloaked in secrecy -- Rutgers couldn't even supply its contract with the Big Ten, eventually admitting it doesn't have a copy.
I’ve been following Rutgers athletics since the mid ‘70’s and there’s not much new in the article that I didn’t already know. I find it difficult to get overly concerned about the athletic department budget that is only 3% of the overall budget of the university yet makes an outsized contribution to its image, branding, donations, etc. Should financial transparency be improved? Most definitely. However, here’s the takeaway from the article in this quote from President Holloway…
“Athletics draws a big bright light,” Holloway said, and some see it as “non-critical to the university's agenda.”
“And you can argue that point, that's fine. You don't have to like athletics,” said Holloway. “But it is part of what Rutgers is, and it's not going to go away. We're not leaving the Big Ten.
“Not under my presidency.”
“Athletics draws a big bright light,” Holloway said, and some see it as “non-critical to the university's agenda.”
“And you can argue that point, that's fine. You don't have to like athletics,” said Holloway. “But it is part of what Rutgers is, and it's not going to go away. We're not leaving the Big Ten.
“Not under my presidency.”
Uh huh, okay.
So what’s your take on the Syracuse game? Another blowout win by Rutgers?
While I think the spurs guy maybe going off the deep end with some of this thoughts on the ramifications of this debt and that the article may have an "agenda", if a good portion of this debt is truly being accumulated to cover annual operating costs beyond the covid year then I think describing it as unsustainable is accurate.
The list of items mentioned over the years on these boards that our full B1G revenue share will "take care of" is long and we have spent those funds many times over. The reason the date for receiving full share continues to get postponed is because of the advance we have taken on our payouts. Yet the debt continues to grow and we still don't have a suitable baseball facility, Lax wants their own place to play and Greg thinks the football facility is inadequate.
Yes like the federal and state governments, it appears higher education budgeting and accounting can lack the transparency. Call it loans, subsidies or whatever, it is real money that has been spent. If the University wants to change the book keeping or forgive the loans they can wipe it off the AD's books but that doesn't change the fact that the university as a whole still needs to repay the associated debt.
While low interest rates make well structured debt program attractive and reasonable way to fund the university's portion of necessary capital improvement projects, RU as a entity and the athletics department within, need to make the hard decisions on spending until they find sustainable revenue sources to match current spending.
The list of items mentioned over the years on these boards that our full B1G revenue share will "take care of" is long and we have spent those funds many times over. The reason the date for receiving full share continues to get postponed is because of the advance we have taken on our payouts. Yet the debt continues to grow and we still don't have a suitable baseball facility, Lax wants their own place to play and Greg thinks the football facility is inadequate.
Yes like the federal and state governments, it appears higher education budgeting and accounting can lack the transparency. Call it loans, subsidies or whatever, it is real money that has been spent. If the University wants to change the book keeping or forgive the loans they can wipe it off the AD's books but that doesn't change the fact that the university as a whole still needs to repay the associated debt.
While low interest rates make well structured debt program attractive and reasonable way to fund the university's portion of necessary capital improvement projects, RU as a entity and the athletics department within, need to make the hard decisions on spending until they find sustainable revenue sources to match current spending.
RU probably has the same guy that runs concessions handling the finances.
There is a reason President Holloway describes the financial situation with Athletics as “unsustainable” and you’ve addressed it well here. Too many people hear the words “we’ll forgive the loan”, and a forget that somebody still has to make those payments. Rutgers Athletics has been the cause of many “forgiven” loans for decades that the university has paid. Recently the situation has become untenable. A statistic that best illustrates how big the hole Rutgers is in is, “Nationally, expenses for athletic programs have swelled by 27% over a five year period for major sports programs, and Rutgers has increased more than twice that,” or 54%. Unsustainable, even with Big Ten money, whenever they get it.
The makes me think of the dweeby loser nerdy professor who cried about schiano being hired only to be ignored
That’s way more information than what I asked. I simply wanted to know where your interests lie. I know the premise of your argument; there was no need to repeat it.
So you’re just a concerned taxpayer? That’s your only agenda? Are you a NJ resident? If so, do you know the exact dollar amount you pay annually to support Rutgers athletics?
This is just so dumb and misleading. The 2020 season had no fans for our bellwether sport (football). Duh!
Do you really think the B1G doesn't know what our revenues are? Come on now, were you born yesterday? They pay us the biggest piece of the revenue stream. They also know football had zero fans last year. Are we spending more than pre-B1G? Of course. Again, were you born yesterday or being puposely ignorant?
And our expenses are more than the average because we are playing catch up on facilities, etc. Let’s see where we are in year 3 of Schiano 2.0, and another few years of Pike’s development of basketball. That’s going to bring in a lot of revenue. If we’re still running way ahead of everyone else on expenses at that time there is reason to be concerned.
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