The Virginia Athletics Foundation's new plan to redistribute season ticket seating assignments based mostly on the size of one's donation fails to consider loyalty as part of the equation. Instead, donors with exceptionally deep pockets are forcing less wealthy football fans to relinquish their seats. The more money you give, the better your seats.
Harsh as this might seem, according to Athletic Director Craig Littlepage and Foundation Executive Director Dirk Katstra, this is the fairest way to redistribute seats.
This latest change came partially as a result of high-level donors -- people who give the Foundation more than $6,200 or "Group A," as their known within the Foundation -- objecting to being seated next to much lower-level donors who, for instance, donate only $300 every year. In May the Foundation announced a plan to adjust seating assignments to better reflect ticket-holders' generosity. Only the new system pays little attention to the number of years donors have given. It places much more emphasis on the amount of the gift.
Donors who give the minimum donations -- even those who have done so for years -- have it the worst. Starting in 2008 when the new policy takes effect, their seats will be reassigned based on a system that ranks donors based mainly on the amount they give annually. Loyalty is considered as part of the ranking system, but as more of a gesture than anything else.
In other words, a recent graduate who gives a one-time gift of $2,500 gets priority over a recent retiree and longtime season ticket-holder who has had seats for 40 years but failed to donate enough money to keep his or her seat.
The Foundation uses some of the revenue from season ticket sales and alumni donations to pay for athletic scholarships (the price of which has increased since the Board of Visitors raised tuition rates), so at least from a business perspective, the new system makes sense. The trouble comes when the Foundation tries to reconcile the demands of donors with the objections of fans who see this as another example of fundraisers ignoring tradition and anyone who doesn't tailgate in a Lexus.
Unfortunately for them, the most equitable distribution of season tickets fails to consider loyalty as a significant part of the equation. The Foundation isn't wrong to try to maximize revenue, but when one considers the new plan as part of a broader fundraising strategy, an unpleasant pattern emerges.
Amidst state budget cuts and an ambitious Capital Campaign, the University has made decisions that appear to value their impact on alumni donations over maintaining a sense of history and tradition. We can't blame a university for trying to raise money, nor should we forget that alumni donations help preserve traditions. But we shouldn't ignore the consequences, either.
As the University becomes more like a private corporation every day, students and alumni cope with the costs. The Foundation's new system is one of them. Awarding Robert Sweeney pavilion residency is another. But while the latter represents an unacceptable corruption of the University's role as an institution of learning, the Foundation's new system might be an acceptable cost of doing business.
Still, try telling that to the football fans next fall when they get their new seat assignments. Hopefully they won't have too much trouble seeing over the people in front of them.
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