Lack of officials in high school sports

They usually call the games but now they’re calling out.

High school officials are quickly disappearing from the field and Michiana athletic director is taking a timeout, for the refs.

Dave Preheim, the athletics director for Concord High School says officials are mistreated and underpaid.

He says officials are mistreated and underpaid.

"I've seen people take pics of officials post on social media and say this guy is terrible," said Preheim.

But now, it's the officials, getting the last laugh.

"More and more people leaving and retiring from profession, fewer are entering it, the ones entering it not staying as long as the other guys did," explains Preheim.

Just last week, the Concord High School Athletics Department tweeted this:

"Lack of contest officials is becoming one of the biggest threats to high school sports in present form."

“Not a problem that the casual fan that only shows up to their local high school not at the problem level most will see yet but for people who have kids, freshman or kids, JV Saturday morning, we have a problem," says Preheim.

It's a problem that Preheim says goes back to 2009.

“The economy was in trouble we had plenty of officials cause there’s a lot of people used it as supplemental income," said Preheim.

But as the economy began improving, Preheim says officials began ejecting themselves from the games.

“It used to be last minute cancellation wouldn’t worry about it too much because people easy to find now last minute cancellation a lot more stressed about it," said Preheim.

In one month, Concord will travel to South Bend for a match up with St. Joseph High School, the Minutemen’s first game of the year.

The game is scheduled for August 18th but only time will tell if it stays that way.

“If something doesn’t change eventually going to work its way up to where it is causing a problem for varsity football games," said Preheim.