The unofficial online home for fans of the UAB Blazers. Part of Collegiate Sports Nation (CSN).

So I put down for the 1/4 of the season ticket price when it was asked for a few weeks ago before it was shut down. Is that now part of the "pledge", and is there a similar "season ticket" option with this new fundraising drive?

That's just for season tickets. The current drive is over and above that - a Football Program Funding Campaign.

Correct. We HOPE to restore that drive in the near future.

Also, are steps underway to have the UAB Football Foundation officially recognized like the UAT football foundation?

I don't think that will happen, certainly not while Watts is still president. I don't think Justin Craft *wants* to handle the money. If you do that then you have to be responsible for the accounting, you get into tax implications, etc. The FF wants to push collecting the money and selling the tickets back to UAB. Then the FF is not responsible, Watts can't say that the money involved is fictional, and donations will be clean charity gifts to the IRS.

As to the tickets, I think that UAB will treat those as valid, but given that Watts has not reinstated the football program, they can hardly start selling tickets and collecting on those commitments just yet.

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Misread that - You'd have to talk to Justin, but if the FF is going to continue as anything but a front name for a couple of big boosters, I think they are going to have to get those mechanisms in place.

(05-08-2015 10:00 AM)WesternBlazer Wrote:  Also, are steps underway to have the UAB Football Foundation officially recognized like the UAT football foundation?

NO in order to be "officially" recognized the UAB football foundation will have to under the umbrella/control of UAB.

Second UAT does not have a "football" foundation but an "athletic" one. I understand the need for now for football only but after Watts to be part of UAB it should not be for one sport only. Of course designated gifts for football would be allowed.

(05-08-2015 10:20 AM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  I don't think that will happen, certainly not while Watts is still president. I don't think Justin Craft *wants* to handle the money. If you do that then you have to be responsible for the accounting, you get into tax implications, etc. The FF wants to push collecting the money and selling the tickets back to UAB. Then the FF is not responsible, Watts can't say that the money involved is fictional, and donations will be clean charity gifts to the IRS.

As to the tickets, I think that UAB will treat those as valid, but given that Watts has not reinstated the football program, they can hardly start selling tickets and collecting on those commitments just yet.

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Misread that - You'd have to talk to Justin, but if the FF is going to continue as anything but a front name for a couple of big boosters, I think they are going to have to get those mechanisms in place.

+1

I have been wondering for months why even simple/basic organizing steps have not been announced. So far it appears that the FF is more in the form of a booster front than a organized fundraising effort that could help UAB in the long run

I don't know that we need a real, organized, incorporated, recognized under IRS rules foundation like the Crimson Tide foundation. That foundation exists so that they can do things that public universities aren't allowed to do, like buy Nick Saban's house and lease it back to him for pennies, or provide a plane and other extra benefits to the staff that doesn't have to be disclosed, or accept donations from people without disclosing who or how much.

If the administration is cooperative, there's no need to funnel donations through the foundation when they can just be handled directly by UAB, and it would be perfectly ok for the foundation to remain an "unofficial" booster group that is basically just representing Jimmy Filler and friends.

I think the main problem is that in the past the BoT/administration has *not* been cooperative, for instance it was not possible to make a donation for football. That's where the leverage of having an outsider group comes in.

(05-08-2015 03:23 PM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  I think the main problem is that in the past the BoT/administration has *not* been cooperative, for instance it was not possible to make a donation for football. That's where the leverage of having an outsider group comes in.

Right, I get that. But if the money is going to do any good, the university will need to be cooperative. In the long run it may not be worth all the hassle of making the UABFF a real foundation, but obviously there has been a need in the near term to have some kind of lobbying group to apply pressure as needed.

(05-08-2015 03:23 PM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  I think the main problem is that in the past the BoT/administration has *not* been cooperative, for instance it was not possible to make a donation for football.

Which I still don't understand, considering this:

http://www.uabsports.com/boosters/sport-...ounts.html