How booster clubs
skirt UH policy

Tradition, politics and money
add up to an exception

By Ian Lind
Star-Bulletin

Third in a series

The University of Hawaii athletic department has not yet complied fully with new Board of Regents' policies requiring all athletic funds, including money raised by booster groups, to be channeled into the university's general treasury.

The difficulties reflect the traditional independence and political clout of some booster groups, as well as a lack of general agreement over their basic purposes and future directions.

The policies, adopted by the Board of Regents in August 1996, originated with the Knight Commission, a high-level committee that made recommendations for the reform of collegiate sports following a series of abuses and scandals nationwide during the 1980s.

The UH athletic department has allowed its largest booster groups to hold their funds in outside accounts, although the athletic director or his assistant are supposed to OK all expenditures.

Associate Athletic Director Jim Donovan said this review process gives the university sufficient control to meet the intent of the regents' policy.

Booster groups say they need separate accounts to avoid a fee of 6 percent of all funds deposited in the UH Foundation. Previously, the foundation charged each account just $25 a year.

Rainbow Fever, a fund-raising effort by local supermarkets and food wholesalers, stopped turning its funds over to the university when the new fees were imposed, Donovan said.

"They said, 'the hell with that; we'll create our own endowment,'" Donovan said. "And for the last five years, no monies have been transferred into the foundation from Rainbow Fever."

A $50,000 donation to the UH football team from former Mayor Frank Fasi was deposited into the independent bank account of Koa Anuenue, the oldest booster group, after Fasi balked at the high fee, according to minutes of Na Koa, the football booster club.

Athletic Director Hugh Yoshida initiated preliminary discussions two years ago of a plan to merge all booster groups under a central umbrella organization, Koa Anuenue. So far, the plans have been rebuffed.

"There are political ramifications when you try to do that," Donovan said.

Koa Anuenue, the oldest and largest of the booster groups, was founded by the late Gov. John A. Burns to fund athletic scholarships and is now headed by his son, Intermediate Court of Appeals Judge James Burns.

One of the groups resisting the consolidation has been Hui Kokua Kinipopo, the baseball booster club, which has its own set of political connections.

Kinipopo's board of directors has in recent years included Senate President Norman Mizuguchi, politically influential businessmen such as Robert McFarlane and Dan Arita, and former state Finance Director Yukio Takemoto.

"University athletics is probably the hornet's nest of politics, and that's saying a lot in Hawaii," said an official from another booster club.

Yes, UH baseball team benefits,
but Kinipopo members do, too

By Ian Lind
Star-Bulletin

Hui Kokua Kinipopo, the University of Hawaii Rainbows' baseball booster club, is fanatical about its baseball team.

The nonprofit group, like all booster organizations, was established to benefit the UH team and its players.

But Kinipopo's federal tax returns suggest that its own members have benefited as much as, or more than, the team or the university. The tax records also show that the team's declining fortunes, along with the state's struggling economy, have resulted in relatively hard times for the baseball boosters.

Kinipopo collected between $250,000 and $330,000 a year in membership dues, fees, merchandise sales and contributions in each of the past three years, the tax returns show.

Over 80 percent of membership dues collected by the group went to buy season tickets, with each member getting two sets. During 1995, the most recent year that tax returns are available, members' tickets cost $135,478.

Just $15,000 a year from the remaining funds has gone into an account at the UH Foundation, where it is spent to benefit the team at the discretion of head coach Les Murakami. The group also occasionally buys special equipment that it donates to the team.

During 1995, Kinipopo spent $90,343 on the costs of special fund-raising events, $11,431 on gifts for members, and $8,679.81 for a reception during the Easter baseball tournament.

Despite heavy fund-raising costs, the group lost a total of $21,402 on its special events during 1995 and ended up with a total profit of just $1,093 for the last three years combined, the records show. The group's fund-raising revenues dropped by more than half, from $146,211 to $68,941, during the same three-year period.

Richard Sato, president of the 26-year-old group, disclosed copies of the group's tax returns, as required by federal law, but would not disclose more detailed records.

Sato acknowledged that the last few years have been difficult but defended Kinipopo's contributions.

He said ticket sales account for such a large part of the group's funds because originally they were hard to sell. "In the early days, nobody wanted the tickets," Sato said. "So we purchased them and sold them to our members. We pushed the tickets."

In addition to the annual contribution to the UH Foundation, Kinipopo also purchases things that are given directly to the team, Sato said. The group's tax returns show a refrigerator was purchased in 1988, carpeting for the players' lounge in 1989 and a stereo in 1991.

Minutes of an October 1996 Kinipopo board meeting show that the group also paid for materials used for a new batting cage.

Sato said Kinipopo members work hard to support the baseball program and the whole athletic department.

"It's our university," Sato said. "We grew up here, we went to the university, and we're proud of it."

"We would like to support the university program as much as we can. ... But our directors donate their time and effort, and I think we all have our own businesses to run. We all have different agendas to worry about."

Isles' boosters lag mainland's

By Star-Bulletin staff

Local booster groups lag behind those at mainland schools in raising funds, according to Associate Athletic Director Jim Donovan.

"Compared to other schools, we are coming up short. That's a fact; that's irrefutable," Donovan said.

Donovan said between $1.4 million and $1.7 million comes in through booster clubs here, while the University of New Mexico probably raises closer to $3 million.

"And a school like Nebraska would just blow us away," he said.

Jeff Portnoy, an active member of the basketball booster club, said other schools benefit from stronger alumni groups, donations from alumni living in other states, more community backing and a tradition of strong fund-raising for athletics.