Sports officiating class opens in Birch Bay to help referee shortage

Growing up in Kodiak, Alaska, Sacha Sanguinetti remembers getting cable TV for the first time and finally being able to watch Major League Baseball games live from his living room. Sanguinetti wasn’t glued to the TV to watch Mike Schmidt hit home runs; he was enamored by the umpires calling balls and strikes.

Sanguinetti, a Birch Bay resident, started his journey into sports officiating when he was just 13, and three decades later, still puts on the stripes to officiate local high school games as often as he can.

With years of experience under his belt – and a critical shortage of referees and officials across all youth sports – Sanguinetti will hold a free “Introduction to Sports Officiating” workshop at 1 p.m. Sunday, April 27 at the Birch Bay Activity Center.

The goal for the introductory workshop isn’t to teach the most extravagant strikeout call – not yet, at least – but to demystify the first steps for anyone interested in sports officiating.

“I’ve heard a lot of, ‘I don’t know how to get started’ or ‘I don’t know where to start,’” Sanguinetti said. “This is going to go through those processes. It’s actually easier than a lot of people think.”

To put it lightly, being a referee is a less-than-thankless job. Getting yelled at by coaches and members of the crowd for a bad call is – for better or worse – a part of sports, Sanguinetti said.

He hopes the class will be able to communicate not only the challenges of officiating, but the rewards as well. The workshop is open to ages 12 and up.

“People can get into it for whatever reason they want. There’s no wrong reason,” Sanguinetti said. “It could be the 60-year-old guy or gal that’s looking for something to do in retirement, it could be a high school kid that’s trying to make a little money on the side, or it could be somebody that’s just doing it for the love of the game.”

The referee shortage is nationwide, and involving every sport. According to a February 2024 study published in The Sport Journal by Matthew Williams of the University of Virginia, the problem has gotten worse since the Covid-19 pandemic, with referees quitting due to “out-of-control” behavior from coaches and people in the stands.

A 2023 survey from the National Association of Sports Officials (NASO) showed that since 2019, registrations for officials dropped roughly 30 percent nationwide, with the average age for officials at 57.

In Whatcom County, the shortage has been the cause of persistent rescheduling in basketball, baseball, softball and football games.

“Bodies are needed,” Sanguinetti said.

It’s difficult to boil down the referee shortage to a single issue, Sanguinetti said, but a generational difference could explain some of the problem. Sanguinetti, 50, is relatively young compared to other officials he works alongside. As older officials retire, fewer are coming up from behind.

“I guess the generations that followed them saw them getting chewed out up and down the court and decided maybe it wasn’t for them,” Sanguinetti said. “That’s really what this course is designed for. I’m going to give them the good, the bad and the ugly.”

Despite the shortage, Sanguinetti said he constantly hears from people of all ages who want to break into sports officiating, but don’t know how to start. He hopes this first class can help build up a new generation of dedicated – and sorely needed – sports officials.

“My reasoning to do this is because I’m a big proponent of athletics,” Sanguinetti said. “I think it plays an important role both at the scholastic level and beyond. Without officials, it doesn’t happen.”