This is counter to what I understand if federation policies. Would someone with more knowledge care to inform us his they are allowed to assign uncertified referees?
Great news for the assignor, good news for those who want to work games without going through certification, maybe not such great news for everyone else. OTOH it may address a need. Even the grade 9 certification is overkill for the typical small sided u6-u8 rec games that use 1 ref, no offside, no pks, no cards. They also don't pay much so reducing the time and cost investment may actually help get more new young refs into the pipeline. Hopefully clubs that do use uncertified refs in their rec games will implement some sort of training program.
That is my guess at what is going on here. I am familiar with clubs that give some basic training to kids and a t-shirt that says referee and then let them run u-8, u-10 in house rec games. The question I have is whether affiated clubs are required to register ALL players with the state associations or whether some of these u-6 to u-10 programs are actually unaffiliated and therefore not covered by the insurance policies of players and officials.
If these are "in house" games, why wouldn't the "house" just find their own people who "know the game" themselves, and cut out the "assignor" who is obviously willing to get paid to put a "ref" who he knows absolutely nothing about on a game. The insurance thing is interesting- will the assignor arrange for insurance if the games are unaffiliated, or insist that the clubs provide? And, if not, do the "refs" even realize they have some liability?
USSF policy is that ALL games must be officiated by USSF registered officials, "except in an emergency." Not having enough officials is not "an emergency" and you can not claim that an emergency happens every week in certain age groups. There is NO exception for recreational youth leagues or "in house" (i.e. intra-club) games. There is also a requirement that all USSF affiliated games are assigned by a USSF registered assignor. Formerly, there was an exemption for assignors of recreational youth leagues but that exemption was eliminated at the USSF Annual General Meeting earlier this year. While I have not read the actual USSF insurance policy, I would venture to say that the unregistered referees are probably covered. The assignor, however, is clearly acting outside of USSF policy. That might be construed by the insurance company as "gross negligence," so the assignor may not have any professional liability coverage for what happens in those games. (e.g. little Billy gets hurt, parents are uninsured and can't pay the hospital bill, so the hospital sues the referee, the league, the other player, the other coach and the assignor, perhaps using the logic that the assignor put an obviously incompetent, unregistered, untrained referee on the game, acting outside of the wise and intelligent USSF policies, and that idiot referee let the game get out of control, leading to the injury to their client.
I don't see why a club cannot register it's competitive program with a state youth soccer association (which is in turn a member of USYSA and USSF) but keep it's recreational program separate.
If the program is unaffiliated with ussf they wouldn't need the state associations permission anyways.
Many "rec" leagues that stay within a single town do this today, always have, always will. Many don't use USSF officials or assignors. Many actually require the refs to be certified with no way to check or prove they are as the assignor isn't certified. Don't know the legality of it, just that it happens, at least around here.
Well, it's "legal" if the rec kids are not registered with USSF affiliates, like the state youth soccer association, US Club, SAY or AYSO. In my experience, however, such clubs do not have insurance coverage for the referees on those games. It is also becoming increasingly common for state law to require that sports officials (as well as coaches) be trained on the recognition and management of concussions and, again in my experience, clubs/leagues that are outside the USSF purview are unlikely to have their officials trained to such state standards.
My kids played, coached and refereed in our local club league, and I served some time on the Board of Directors. At the lowest age-lowest level of rec season, the league often used referees trained in our own internal program, but anything looking like a regular soccer game (even 8v8, small goals and field) requires certified referees (with some allowance for club linesmen). For the high school, on the other hand, during a recent referee strike, freshman games were played with the 2 coaches officiating, and JV and varsity games used the coaches from the other gender (boys JV and freshman coach refereed the girls games). And maybe I am just being fussy about language, but I have a hard time imagining an "emergency" that requires the playing of a soccer game.
As I understand it, "an emergency" is something like the assigned referee doesn't show up for the game. That's how I ended up doing the first game I ever did, before I was certified. U-14 girls. I even cautioned the daughter of the other team's coach with a piece of yellow paper I had in my pocket.