Budget crunch hits Oak Lawn coaches

Updated: March 22, 2011 5:14PM

Oak Lawn football coach RonThornburgh was called into a meeting at 7:30 Friday morning in the school's auditorium.

By 7:40, he - and every other Spartans fall sports coach - was out of a job.

Sort of.

"Yeah, it was a surprise to me," Thornburgh. "It's not the greatest feeling in the world. But, at the same time, we trust in what our administration is doing."

On Friday, athletic director Will Dwyer gathered the 24 fall sports coaches who are also full-time Oak Lawn teachers and told them they would be officially notified during evaluations that they would not be retained as coaches next season. Dwyer said the move was necessary to provide the school with maximum flexibility in the face of budgetary uncertainty for the 2011-12 school year.

"We had to let everyone go with the understanding that, if the non-retention was due to budgetary uncertainty, then if that position comes back, they retain the rights to that job," Dwyer said.

Citing confidentiality requirements in personnel decisions, Dwyer declined to say whether any of the non-retentions were for reasons other than budgetary. He did allow, "There could be a coach let go for performance issues, (but) the majority will be for budgetary reasons."

He expressed confidence that winter and spring coaches would not face automatic non-retention, saying, "My hope is, by March (evaluations), we will have a much clearer budget picture."

Among the "wild cards" Dwyer noted as impediments to budget planning are the inability to predict state funding and the uncertain outcome of an ongoing fundraising campaign by the school.

The latter's goal is to raise $150,000 by the end of the school year. Dwyer said the Spartans community has thus far brought in roughly $36,000.

The next fundraising event is a Bears game viewing party from noon to 5 p.m. Nov. 7 at Bourbon Street in Merrionette Park. Tickets are available through the school's web site, olchs.org.

Though Dwyer noted the mood Friday was, "somber - there was a lot of

uncertainty, some sadness, probably some anger," he added, "All of the

coaches have been incredibly involved in the fundraising."

Expect that to continue.

"I can only speak for the football staff," Thornburgh, who has a 15-23 record in four seasons as the Spartans' coach, said. "We're going to go about our business as usual, getting our football team ready for next year.

"We were getting after it (on the fundraising front) before all this came out. We'll continue to get after it."

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