USARFU salaries top 25 percent of budget

USARFU's 2011 personnel costs surpassed a quarter of the organization's revenue, reaching nearly $2 million.

Salaries, benefits, payroll tax, and the like have climbed by 33 percent over the 5-year period beginning 2007, the first full year of the Kevin Roberts-Nigel Melville era, according to USARFU's Internal Revenue Service filings.

In the same time, revenue grew by 6%, to $7.5 million, with dues accounting for $3.2 million, from up $2.1 million in 2007, a 49 percent gain. 2011 is the latest year for which records are publicly available.

The personnel figures are surprising in that high school and college rugby teams are now administered by 'state-based organizations' and NCAA-style conferences, respectively. In theory, many of Boulder's responsibilities and personnel expenses should have been distributed to regional organizations, better attuned to local wants and needs.

'The creation of SBROs, college conferences, and GUs [geographic unions] has actually created a need for more staff oversight rather than less', chief financial officer Jen Cope said in an email. 'These org[anization]s need assistance on various levels -- from getting started, creating corporations, gaining non-profit status to hiring directors, collecting dues, creating and managing leagues, etc.'

During 2007-11, the union's year-end balance of funds declined to -$726,000 in 2011 from -$115,000 in 2007, a decrease of 526 percent.

Fast-growing CIPP (Club and Individual Participation Program) fees have been underwriting increased personnel costs, but haven't gained enough to stop the union from falling further in the hole. In other words, any additional services Boulder which has been providing have not been covered by revenue.

Four of the last five years, the union added to its net debt, though it is thought that 2012 may show improvement.

At present, 43 staff are identified on USARFU's web site. The roster appears to omit part-timers: Such prominent figures as the collegiate and high school All-American coaches, the Under-20 coach, and the Eagle 7s manager are not listed.

Executive salaries, which must be disclosed to the IRS, have been relatively stable. This too indicates cost growth owes to increased headcount.

Comments

[We're #18]

11 TONGA 74.77
12 ITALY 74.17
13 FIJI 73.56
14 JAPAN 71.98
15 CANADA 71.55
16 GEORGIA 67.66
17 ROMANIA 66.18
18 USA 66.04
19 RUSSIA 61.99
20 SPAIN 60.44
21 URUGUAY 59.87
22 PORTUGAL58.82
23 NAMIBIA 58.70

[The Commish]

Kurt-
I would love it if you got examples of which college conferences needed all this help. We have a couple volunteers who handle all this stuff for our conference in our spare time. It involves some work, no doubt, but its not overly difficult. I mean, collecting league membership fees is as simple as sending an invoice to our member teams and then they send our treasurer a check.

[Roger Roger]

Hear, hear The Commish.

The only help my conference needed was wading through USA Rugby issues, nothing to do with actually establishing and running a college rugby conference.

[The Commish]

Also, I'd be curious which USAR employees were/are the ones helping with these tasks, since I got many calls from other conferences because they had been directed by USAR to me with questions about various things related to setting up/running a conference. And last I checked, I wasn't on the USAR payroll...

[Johnny Rotten]

Who will be the first college conference to not pay dues this fall?

That will be the one thing that brings down Nigel's puzzle palace. If conferences can resolve the referee issue, USAR will have lost a huge chunk of its revenue and won't be able to pay those salaries!

[CEO not!]

It is a bloated USAR staff. Lots of unneeded employees. The bigger the payroll at USAR has gotten the less the organization does.

It is not only the number of employees, it is the quality of employee. Not really bad people, but individuals who are largely without the skill sets to add value.

So how did this happen, where we wake one day and find not a lean highly capable NGB, but a bloated, inexperienced and underachieving staff? It was the hiring of Nigel Melville as CEO! Melville had never had an executive position. He had not only never been a CEO, he never had a senior management position. Never had administrative, decision making, balance sheet/budget responsibility, human resources, media/communications, marketing/promotions, event management, etc. Nothing. He had and still hasn't ever led a company or organization. He was a short-term, unsuccessful salesman for Nike and a fired director of rugby for a club.

Melville applied for the USAR director of rugby job, which was a reasonable fit. Not sure he was the right man for the job, but it could be argued. Kevin Roberts had hand-picked Kiwi John Kirwan for the USAR CEO position, but Kirwan left KR at the altar choosing the Japan RFU over USAR.

The USAR brain trust of KR and Bob Latham then had the great idea of giving their director of rugby candidate the CEO position as well. And as they say the rest is history.

Except for the unintended result of who Melville has hired as staff under him. It is all to clear from where we sit now. Who do people who are out of their depth hire? Yes men, people with even less skills than themselves and people who won't say shite even with a mouth full.

USAR is a bloated mess. The Board also deserves some special recognition is all of this. Instead of setting the course and evaluating the management per their role, they have largely been only interested in packaging little bits of success into far larger accomplishments. When this whole crew leaves, USAR will be far worse off than when they came. It is only the IRB's grant money which has seen them partially through. That and taxing the hell out of the membership for nothing in return.

[too fat]

As pointed out in the article, USAr has more than 43 individuals on compensation. Some of the non-identified positions are even on significant compensation. For example, Kevin Battle is paid a chunk to be the D1A commissioner. That's really going well, massive ROI there :-)

[crisis of leadership]

Over the last 5 years of Kevin Roberts and Nigel Melville.

1) Revenue flat with modest 6% increase (due to increased membership taxes).

2) Year-end balances in significant %500 decline,

3) However, salaries are up a whopping 33%

[Deal with it]

"Year-end balances in significant %500 decline"
How does one generate a decline of 500 percent?