(01-12-2016 08:13 PM)temchugh Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 02:28 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  from the article:

Quote:"SEC schools each received about $34 million in revenue from TV contracts, the College Football Playoff and the NCAA men's basketball tournament in 2014-2015. Conference USA schools received about $2.5 million in similar outside revenue."

Yeah, the Rice admin and BOT didn't want to invest $70-$100 million when it had a chance back in the day to go SEC with Arkansas. We are one of the few G5 type schools that actually have the ability to do that. Would have made that investment back many times over.

It's not just a sunk cost, it's an investment in growing revenues. Sure it comes with risk. Most investments do.

So will they learn their lesson and choose to invest more heavily now, the money that was withheld from Rice sports in the past that they used for other things, or continue to pursue the same strategy that got us where we are?

Today, Vanderbilt has an annual deficit (university subsidy) for athletics that is just as large as ours. You can argue that they are getting a better return for their $$$. However, there is no evidence that a $70 million investment to go to the SEC with Arkansas would have paid for itself in terms of lower annual athletics deficits.

Right now, going to a P5 conference would increase our annual athletics deficit for the foreseeable future.

Probably how Vanderbilt passed us in the national rankings too.

(01-12-2016 08:13 PM)temchugh Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 02:28 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  from the article:

Quote:"SEC schools each received about $34 million in revenue from TV contracts, the College Football Playoff and the NCAA men's basketball tournament in 2014-2015. Conference USA schools received about $2.5 million in similar outside revenue."

Yeah, the Rice admin and BOT didn't want to invest $70-$100 million when it had a chance back in the day to go SEC with Arkansas. We are one of the few G5 type schools that actually have the ability to do that. Would have made that investment back many times over.

It's not just a sunk cost, it's an investment in growing revenues. Sure it comes with risk. Most investments do.

So will they learn their lesson and choose to invest more heavily now, the money that was withheld from Rice sports in the past that they used for other things, or continue to pursue the same strategy that got us where we are?

Today, Vanderbilt has an annual deficit (university subsidy) for athletics that is just as large as ours. You can argue that they are getting a better return for their $$$. However, there is no evidence that a $70 million investment to go to the SEC with Arkansas would have paid for itself in terms of lower annual athletics deficits.

Right now, going to a P5 conference would increase our annual athletics deficit for the foreseeable future.

Reducing the deficit isn't as important as getting value for money. 20 ,million a year would be a steal for the University to shell out to get major publicity.

Back in the 70's/80's and early 90s it seems more or less agreed here that Rice did not spend the level on its athletics programs that its peer schools did in order tom keep pace. Indeed, Rice seems guilty of trying to exist on the revenues produced from playing much larger schools it was formerly associated with.

If that money had been invested in the athletics dept and sports programs, Rice would not have had it for other uses. Some of that money became part of the endowment, which has grown over those 30-40m years somewhat beyond what it would have been had that extra money that Rice chose not to spend on athletics not been available.

In essence, the university "borrowed" (my quotes) that money from athletics. So, from that perspective, spending more on athletics by the university is a form of repaying the money the university borrowed from athletics by withholding much of it all those years.

This would not be true if Rice did not have athletics, or not as true if Rice was competing on a lower level. So for Rice to set goals to ostensibly compete on the Div I level, as it always historically has, and Rice athletics being in need of increased monies to catch up to where it might have been had it spent more in line with the norms for schools that became P5, there is a case for sufficient justification in expecting greater increased levels of funding from the university for the Athletic Dept. McKinsey study laid things out for Rice, but Rice never fully committed to the plan and the commensurate financial investment that plan would take to be successful.

I think when we hired Bailiff, his initial salary was around $400K. Because we didn't want to spend $1million back then, we limited our choices. Today, we are giving bailiff $800K for the results we've gotten. Many here acknowledge that a better class of coaches can be had for a doubling of what we're currently willing to spend on a head coach and staff. We know the costs will keep rising. But if we constantly seek to be at the bottom end, we are more likely to get bottom end results while other schools pick from the more highly regarded coaches and assistants. It is not a guarantee, of course, but we seem to be unnecessarily choosing to handicap ourselves from the get-go.

I'm talking about the next coach and staff, of course. Giving Bailiff more money would only prolong the agony. If anything pay should be docked, but coaches don't get paid on performance like many normal people do.

(01-13-2016 01:11 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  I think when we hired Bailiff, his initial salary was around $400K. Because we didn't want to spend $1million back then, we limited our choices. Today, we are giving bailiff $800K for the results we've gotten.

Not sure about Bailiff's starting salary, but I thought some of the insiders here said that the offer to Todd Graham before he bolted for Tulsa was in the $1 M range, unless my memory of posts gone by is faulty.

Doesn't Boise receive more money than everyone else? I seem to remember that the MWC sweetened the pot to keep Boise in the MWC after BYU left.

(01-12-2016 04:48 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 04:31 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 04:13 PM)mrbig Wrote:  Rice needs to be going to the P5 conferences prostrate with a commitment to spend what needs to be spent on facilities and future investments moving forward and a commitment to waive 75% of conference revenues for 5 years until the facility infrastructure is upgraded. Sure, it will cost a lot of money. But it will pay for itself within 20 years, probably faster, and Rice doesn't have to mess with academic restrictions or everything else, and other conferences don't have to view Rice as a leach on their $$$ revenues until such time as Rice is contributing to the pot. Rather than a random 5-year window before Rice received full P5 revenue, Rice's initial conference revenue could be tied to attendance/performance benchmarks. With the caveat that once the benchmarks were met, Rice was a full member moving forward.

How depressing ... and unsurprising ... and completely deserved.

It'll never be enough. No P5 cares about tiny Rice. No amount of concessions can buy Rice a P5 invitation. All Rice is good for, to the P5 schools, is home schedule filler. They pay us to get our teeth kicked in. Period.

And you know this because ...? I don't mind you expressing your opinion, but at least couch it as such. Unless you have inside info to the contrary.

I would agree with you if Rice was not in a huge city. But Rice is in a huge city and is in FBS, and as long as those remain true, I think it would be foolish for anyone to say there is a 0% chance of it happening. Rice just needs to give better conferences a reason to consider Rice, which means Rice needs to turn itself into a net positive for those conferences. Rice is admittedly a long, long way from being a net positive to a P5 conference. There are a number of different reasons why, and my suggestions alleviate some of the problems with Rice becoming a P5.

I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

You are entitled to your opinion, so long as you realize, and perhaps even acknowledge, that it is just that ... your opinion. Plus, I see you mentioned two of the five P5 conferences having market saturation, and I agree with you. I think those 2 conferences make the least sense for adding a Texas-based team. But I could see the ACC, PAC, or B1G having some interest in Texas. Whether they were interested in Rice is an entirely separate matter.

And have you listened to JK's podcasts? Pretty sure he has strongly suggested that Rice would be interested in improving its conference affiliation, even if he hasn't said it out-right.

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 04:48 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 04:31 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  

(01-12-2016 04:13 PM)mrbig Wrote:  Rice needs to be going to the P5 conferences prostrate with a commitment to spend what needs to be spent on facilities and future investments moving forward and a commitment to waive 75% of conference revenues for 5 years until the facility infrastructure is upgraded. Sure, it will cost a lot of money. But it will pay for itself within 20 years, probably faster, and Rice doesn't have to mess with academic restrictions or everything else, and other conferences don't have to view Rice as a leach on their $$$ revenues until such time as Rice is contributing to the pot. Rather than a random 5-year window before Rice received full P5 revenue, Rice's initial conference revenue could be tied to attendance/performance benchmarks. With the caveat that once the benchmarks were met, Rice was a full member moving forward.
How depressing ... and unsurprising ... and completely deserved.

It'll never be enough. No P5 cares about tiny Rice. No amount of concessions can buy Rice a P5 invitation. All Rice is good for, to the P5 schools, is home schedule filler. They pay us to get our teeth kicked in. Period.

And you know this because ...? I don't mind you expressing your opinion, but at least couch it as such. Unless you have inside info to the contrary.
I would agree with you if Rice was not in a huge city. But Rice is in a huge city and is in FBS, and as long as those remain true, I think it would be foolish for anyone to say there is a 0% chance of it happening. Rice just needs to give better conferences a reason to consider Rice, which means Rice needs to turn itself into a net positive for those conferences. Rice is admittedly a long, long way from being a net positive to a P5 conference. There are a number of different reasons why, and my suggestions alleviate some of the problems with Rice becoming a P5.

I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

I'm going to agree at least in part with Afflicted here. If Rice wants the P5's to care about Rice, then Rice needs to make them care.

Becoming Navy in football and Gonzaga in basketball, plus putting 30-35,000 in Rice Stadium and 5,000 in Tudor every time we opened the doors, might be enough to do that. But of course, we are nowhere near doing that. And if we got to that point, would going into a P5 conference and being a bottom feeder in that league really make sense?

I'm really thinking that a situation where we were dominating CUSA, making the finances work with a combination of drawing enough fans plus big money games with old rivals LSU and aTm, getting invited to a bowl and to the Dance most years, and having a spirited crosstown rivalry with UH, would be a pretty sweet spot to find ourselves. Let's assume 20,000/game more for football, times 6 games is 120,000, at $50/pop including parking and concessions, would be $6 million more in annual revenue. Basketball at 3,000 more per game, times 15 home games would be 45,000, times $40/pop, would be another $1.8 million. Round that up to $8 million, and note that if we were doing that then we would be getting a bunch more TV exposure and money. That would roughly cut the BOT subsidy in half, or better if split with the other end of the street would give us $4 million more to do what's needed.

If we were doing that, there would be interest from P5 leagues. I'm just not sure we aren't better playing 4 P5's and 8 CUSA-types, than playing 8 P5's and four CUSA-types.

(01-13-2016 04:49 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

You are entitled to your opinion, so long as you realize, and perhaps even acknowledge, that it is just that ... your opinion. Plus, I see you mentioned two of the five P5 conferences having market saturation, and I agree with you. I think those 2 conferences make the least sense for adding a Texas-based team. But I could see the ACC, PAC, or B1G having some interest in Texas. Whether they were interested in Rice is an entirely separate matter.

And have you listened to JK's podcasts? Pretty sure he has strongly suggested that Rice would be interested in improving its conference affiliation, even if he hasn't said it out-right.

Afflicted functions on the level of Andrew Wakefield - make **** up and hope to god some wack-a-doodles listen.

(01-13-2016 04:59 PM)Antarius Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 04:49 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

You are entitled to your opinion, so long as you realize, and perhaps even acknowledge, that it is just that ... your opinion. Plus, I see you mentioned two of the five P5 conferences having market saturation, and I agree with you. I think those 2 conferences make the least sense for adding a Texas-based team. But I could see the ACC, PAC, or B1G having some interest in Texas. Whether they were interested in Rice is an entirely separate matter.

And have you listened to JK's podcasts? Pretty sure he has strongly suggested that Rice would be interested in improving its conference affiliation, even if he hasn't said it out-right.

Afflicted functions on the level of Andrew Wakefield - make **** up and hope to god some wack-a-doodles listen.

I don't care what his opinion is, I can be respectful about it even if I disagree with it. But I don't like people stating their opinion as fact, especially when that opinion, if treated as fact, would impute beliefs or facts to others that are not part of the conversation. But whatever, I can respectfully stop responding to him if decides to entrench.

(01-13-2016 01:49 AM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 01:11 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  I think when we hired Bailiff, his initial salary was around $400K. Because we didn't want to spend $1million back then, we limited our choices. Today, we are giving bailiff $800K for the results we've gotten.

Not sure about Bailiff's starting salary, but I thought some of the insiders here said that the offer to Todd Graham before he bolted for Tulsa was in the $1 M range, unless my memory of posts gone by is faulty.

If what you say is true, then you'd be correct that Rice was willing to pay another coach in the $1million range back then. This was before Todd Graham's second season at Rice (and second as a head coach anywhere.) Was it more that we decided after Graham left the way he did not to spend for another of that level of coach, or that we found what we thought we were looking for based on that in Bailiff and really didn't have to, irrespective of salary requirements?

My feeling is that we generally seek to be at the low end of whatever the coaching scale is, rather than targeting otherwise compatible or capable options who might demand somewhere in the middle or more of Div I coaching compensation, and that's what I was trying to convey with that part of that post. IOW expected salary seems to have been very high on Rice's concerns when hiring, and perhaps that hurts us in getting the best talent we need capable of making the sustained difference many might have liked to see here.

(01-13-2016 03:36 PM)Brookes Owl Wrote:  I believe the planned capacity is 70K, expandable to 100K for events. And I would guess the league could/would give the new team(s) special consideration while they are in the Coliseum.

That said, I think the blackout rules were suspended for 2015 and the NFL is considering whether they should just take them off the books entirely. Might be a non-issue.

Thanks. The blackout rules made more sense when teams didn't receive such a high amount of revenue from TV rights. I wonder whether they even make any sense now. I recall in the 70's and 80's the Braves, Cubs and Mets making a substantial portion of their games available on TCG/TBS, WGN and WOR respectively. Not like many of those teams were always great during those years, but they developed a fan following because they were always on free TV in the summers.

I have a thought about this as it related to Rice, but I'll go post it in the CUSA revenue thread instead.

continued here: I wonder, with the reduction in the CUSA TV contract, if there is any interest/way the CUSA teams could seek to gain an option to put some of their games on the free local TV in their areas if they wished to. Probably not, but what made me think of this as far as fan-building for Rice is that the Braves built a local (and national) following
by having almost all their games broadcast by WTCG and later TBS during years in the 70's/80s when they were beyond abysmal. Yet people still watched because they were on free tv, and they became fans of the team despite how truly awful it was most of the time.

Now, those were different times, with more limited offerings in general, although cable TV programming availability came into its own during the early 80's.

A lot of folks these days do not have full cable packages, or are dropping them, or just have free tv, and supplementing with streaming services and the like online. I wonder if some of this lower tier market would be untapped enough and interested enough in watching Rice sports on free TV in the Houston region if it could be made available to them not so much as a revenue-generator for Rice, but just provided to a media outlet to get the product in front of people consistently? Of course, games are still available on other major free networks, so to make it work well, we also might have to schedule game times/nights differently.

This is probably going nowhere, but just trying to think outside the box on where we can develop/tap into a potential additional fanbase. What about developing a way to make Rice sports programming exclusively available to hospitals/professional offices in the Med Center something like CNN does at airports?

Well, I guess selling beer at games is also going to get a better look now that tv contract revenues are being reduced.

(01-13-2016 07:20 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 01:49 AM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 01:11 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  I think when we hired Bailiff, his initial salary was around $400K. Because we didn't want to spend $1million back then, we limited our choices. Today, we are giving bailiff $800K for the results we've gotten.

Not sure about Bailiff's starting salary, but I thought some of the insiders here said that the offer to Todd Graham before he bolted for Tulsa was in the $1 M range, unless my memory of posts gone by is faulty.

If what you say is true, then you'd be correct that Rice was willing to pay another coach in the $1million range back then. This was before Todd Graham's second season at Rice (and second as a head coach anywhere.) Was it more that we decided after Graham left the way he did not to spend for another of that level of coach, or that we found what we thought we were looking for based on that in Bailiff and really didn't have to, irrespective of salary requirements?

My feeling is that we generally seek to be at the low end of whatever the coaching scale is, rather than targeting otherwise compatible or capable options who might demand somewhere in the middle or more of Div I coaching compensation, and that's what I was trying to convey with that part of that post. IOW expected salary seems to have been very high on Rice's concerns when hiring, and perhaps that hurts us in getting the best talent we need capable of making the sustained difference many might have liked to see here.

I was able to find a reference to CUSA salaries in 2008. TG was getting $1.1M, while DB was making $400k.
source: http://www.scout.com/college/rice/forums...s-salaries (flashback, eh Moondog?)

This article from 2007 indicates an interesting sequence of events, that I'm not sure I remember - that the Rice extension was a reaction to Tulsa offering the job to TG after Kragthorpe left. Only for TG to change his mind after signing the extension.

Quote:Graham, TU’s former defensive coordinator, had been offered the job shortly after Steve Kragthorpe’s departure for Louisville. But Rice officials countered by extending the first-year head coach’s contract through 2012. And several sources said Tulsa officials had been looking at other candidates, including former Miami coach Larry Coker, Oklahoma defensive coordinator Brent Venables and Oklahoma State offensive coordinator Larry Fedora.

source: http://newsok.com/article/2998098

The other names considered were kind of interesting, too.

The only other thing I found was a rumor on an OSU board that said the Tulsa offer was about twice what Rice had offered. Which means Rice was probably around $500k (or a little more) on the extension.

Quote:According to several NCAA officials, Tulsa offered Graham twice the annual salary he was set to earn at Rice.

School officials declined to match Tulsa's above-market offer. NCAA officials said Graham's deal at Tulsa pays between $1 milliion and $1.2 million a season.

source (see item 10): http://www.orangepower.com/threads/tulsa...ham.30728/

I'm definitely skeptical that Rice offered anywhere close to $1M to keep TG. The $500k seems about what I might have expected them to pay at the time (or think that he was worth), and they came back hiring DB at $400k.

(01-13-2016 04:49 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

You are entitled to your opinion, so long as you realize, and perhaps even acknowledge, that it is just that ... your opinion. Plus, I see you mentioned two of the five P5 conferences having market saturation, and I agree with you. I think those 2 conferences make the least sense for adding a Texas-based team. But I could see the ACC, PAC, or B1G having some interest in Texas. Whether they were interested in Rice is an entirely separate matter.

And have you listened to JK's podcasts? Pretty sure he has strongly suggested that Rice would be interested in improving its conference affiliation, even if he hasn't said it out-right.

All I can go on is history. For 30 years I've seen how Rice operates. It' won't ever get into a P5, because it doesn't care to be in one. That doesn't matter to Rice. Rice hasn't, and will never, prioritize athletics. To get into a P5, you have to prioritize athletics. There's no way that will ever happen on South Main. Rice wants a competitive football program that graduates exceptional student-athletes. Period. And yes, I have listened to all the podcasts, and it's only prudent for the AD to get us into the best conference possible, but it's not going to be the BIG10 or ACC or any other P5. I've seen enough for 30 years to know that this is fact.

(01-13-2016 04:59 PM)Antarius Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 04:49 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-13-2016 03:41 PM)Afflicted Wrote:  I don't need any proof that it's true. I don't need to site references or give up the source of any inside information. All it takes is common sense. Rice is a tiny private school, with 10,00 fans, that doesn't care nearly enough about athletics to get into a P5 conference. It won't happen. The P5 conferences in the area already have market saturation in Houston. Their alums are everywhere. The eyeballs in Houston are already watching all the BIG12 and SEC games. They don't need Rice for any reason. Rice doesn't even care about P5 conferences. You guys can throw all the stones you want, but it's true.

You are entitled to your opinion, so long as you realize, and perhaps even acknowledge, that it is just that ... your opinion. Plus, I see you mentioned two of the five P5 conferences having market saturation, and I agree with you. I think those 2 conferences make the least sense for adding a Texas-based team. But I could see the ACC, PAC, or B1G having some interest in Texas. Whether they were interested in Rice is an entirely separate matter.

And have you listened to JK's podcasts? Pretty sure he has strongly suggested that Rice would be interested in improving its conference affiliation, even if he hasn't said it out-right.

Afflicted functions on the level of Andrew Wakefield - make **** up and hope to god some wack-a-doodles listen.

Cute

Keep in mind for Rice this is even worse. Not only do you have less revenue from the TV contracts but you also have the exit fees from all the former C-USA schools that bailed to AAC were also being paid out to the older C-USA schools like Rice. So it is a double whammy that is >1M/year from prior years, not just $500K for these new contracts.

Just my personal opinion but I think this is the sandwich board event for JK. Always have had the longer-term frog in boiling water argument about C-USA but this might be the event that finally tips things to be much more proactive about a new home.

(01-14-2016 06:58 PM)owl40 Wrote:  Keep in mind for Rice this is even worse. Not only do you have less revenue from the TV contracts but you also have the exit fees from all the former C-USA schools that bailed to AAC were also being paid out to the older C-USA schools like Rice. So it is a double whammy that is >1M/year from prior years, not just $500K for these new contracts.

Just my personal opinion but I think this is the sandwich board event for JK. Always have had the longer-term frog in boiling water argument about C-USA but this might be the event that finally tips things to be much more proactive about a new home.

Very good point. Given the renewed focus on revenue in the department, I am sure this dropoff has been noted by them and resonates significantly.

(01-14-2016 07:07 PM)Antarius Wrote:  Very good point. Given the renewed focus on revenue in the department, I am sure this dropoff has been noted by them and resonates significantly.

At a time when we also start paying the cost of attendance stipends. It's all back to the McKinsey Report and go big or go home.

(01-14-2016 06:58 PM)owl40 Wrote:  Just my personal opinion but I think this is the sandwich board event for JK. Always have had the longer-term frog in boiling water argument about C-USA but this might be the event that finally tips things to be much more proactive about a new home

... by doing [what, that's not already being done?]

When does the current TV package expire? If we do leave, when would notification have to be given to the CUSA office?