The Dolores High School football team will play in the 1A Southern Peaks conference this fall, according to Bert Borgmann, assistant commissioner at the Colorado High School Activities Association.
Borgmann told The Journal on Wednesday that the school requested to re-enter the conference, but he could not verify who made the request.
“I think it was a simple resolution to what could have been a sticky problem,” Borgmann said.
This season’s schedule for the 1A Southern Peaks conference was made in January, before the district’s request to play as an independent had been processed.
“In spite of everything, they had still not been moved out of that conference, and the schedule was made in January,” Borgmann said.
“They are all back together in the same conference they had last year,” he said.
The football team’s status with CHSAA was a point of contention in the school board meeting on April 12. During that meeting, the Dolores School District RE-4A board unanimously accepted athletic director Chris Trusler’s resignation.
Parents and residents complained that the district had opted out of its relationship with CHSAA, the governing body of high school athletics in Colorado, which manages team schedules and playoffs.
Under independent status, the school would have been responsible for its own schedule, and would not have been eligible for postseason playoffs.
Last fall, then-athletic director Trusler requested that the football program be classified under “independent status,” Borgmann said.
“It was a decision that was made by the athletic director to be placed as a varsity independent team,” Borgmann said on April 13.