Recently imposed budget restrictions on public high school sports programs may affect state tournament participation numbers as soon as spring 2009, after the Hawai'i High School Athletic Association's executive board yesterday suggested that cutbacks may be required to reduce costs.

The HHSAA has 94 member high schools throughout the state and administers the 41 state tournaments in 19 sports throughout the year.

The board will form a special committee — including an executive director and one athletic director from each of the state's five leagues — which will meet Dec. 2 to discuss ways to reduce the number of participants in the spring state tournaments.

The sports that could be affected are baseball, softball, track and field, golf, tennis, girls water polo and judo.

The HHSAA executive board will vote on those proposals at its Jan. 14 meeting.

"When (financial) times were not so bad, we wanted as many kids participating (in state tournaments) as possible," said O'ahu Interscholastic Association executive director Dwight Toyama, who also serves as the Department of Education's liaison for athletics. "Now that times are bad, we gotta change our thinking."

HHSAA President Meredith Maeda, principal of Castle High School, echoed Toyama's recommendation and explained that the state tournaments will effectively become more exclusive.

"What Dwight is saying is we're moving from a philosophy of participation to a philosophy of competition," Maeda said.

Last month, the DOE announced $46 million in proposed budget cuts for the school years 2009-10 and 2010-11, including a total of about $800,000 for athletics. About $372,000 of those cuts are targeted for transportation

But for some schools, their transportation allotment is exhausted before the spring season even begins.

Big Island Interscholastic Federation interim executive director Lyle Crozier said a round-trip bus ride from Kona to Hilo can cost $600. Kaua'i Interscholastic Federation executive director Dianne Nitta said the round-trip travel cost from Kapa'a to Waimea is $380, and Maui Interscholastic League executive director Joe Balangitao said a round-trip bus ride from Lahaina to Pukalani costs $300.

Balangitao and Toyama said the proposed cuts would effectively slash their travel budgets in half.

As an example of how cutting back on participants could save money, Toyama said that if they were to cut the cross country participation number (a fall sport that won't be affected this year) from 100 boys and 100 girls to 60 participants each that would save $37,000.

The leagues already have had their own discussions about ways to save on travel, including shortening schedules, playing doubleheaders (two games in one day) and sharing buses for schools that are along the same route.

Read his blog on high school sports at http://preptalk.honadvblogs.com.