The KHSAA Hearing Officer presiding at the appeal of Dakotah Euton and Chad Jackson's appeal of KHSAA commissioner Brigid DeVries' earlier ruling and clarification that they are ineligible has issued a favorable ruling for both young men that recommends they be made eligible to play at Scott County next season.
According to the revised due process procedures of the KHSAA, here is what happens next:
- Each party to the hearing has 15 days from the date that the findings were mailed to them to object to anything in the findings;
- 15 days after that, Brigid DeVries must act. She can:
- Accept the Hearing Officer's decision and adopt it as final;
- Reject or modify the order in whole or in part;
- Remand the order to the Hearing Officer, in whole or in part, for "further proceedings as appropriate." - After issuance of a final order, the order may be subjected to judicial review (i.e. a lawsuit may be filed).
The part that gives me trouble is the "remand the order to the Hearing Officer" part. There doesn't seem to be any guidance in the procedure for what is supposed to happen during the remand, nor the deadlines for any rulings out of that rehearing.
The old procedure used to require the Board of Control to consider the appeal at its next regularly scheduled meeting, but this was changed fairly recently to expedite the rulings. I am not quite sure if the new procedure has been implemented as of the date of the Euton/Jackson appeal, or if we are still operating under the old procedure. The old procedure has different, longer deadlines than the above that could easily result in this appeal going well into the school year.
There should be more reporting on this soon by people with access to more facts than me, and I will update the blog as information becomes available.
UPDATE 08:46 AM: If this story is accurate, the old procedure is still in force.