Philomath resident Dave Brooks has a familiar face that many longtime residents in town would likely recognize.
For years, he served as the pastor at New Life Fellowship Church and made appearances at various local events to give the invocation. Or, maybe you’ve seen him jogging around town — he developed a love for running while in his 20s. Plus, he’s lived in Philomath since 1986 and crossing paths with other locals is just a part of life in a small town.
Those that follow athletics will know Brooks for his contributions to officiating — particularly basketball. As March wraps up, he’s closing a significant chapter in his life that has included more than three decades of officiating games with the last 19 as the commissioner of the Mid Valley Basketball Officials Association.
Brooks, 70, got into officiating as a man in his mid- to late-30s during the 1992-93 basketball season. He had been a youth pastor prior to his move to Philomath and with a background that also included athletics, he was approached to officiate a basketball game.
He recalled, “I remember getting on the court and thinking, that’s a travel, that’s a foul, but could I blow the whistle?”
Not long after, he saw an advertisement for basketball officials and that training was included.
“I went to the first meeting and discovered it was quite a bit more involved than I imagined,” Brooks said. “But I thought, I’ll give it a go. Then I found out that there was payment involved and they actually gave game pay — I thought it was a volunteer thing.”
Referred to by officials as “pizza and beer” money, the payment wasn’t a lot, maybe $25 to $30 as Brooks remembers.
“I did it for that first year and it just got into my blood,” Brooks said. “It was something that just clicked and I enjoyed it and it was challenging. And I felt like it was kind of giving back as well because the kids can’t play the game without officials.”
Fast forward to this season. Last month, Brooks said he was talked into working a game at East Linn Christian. The pregame announcements included recognition of his years of service to officiating. (On a side note, Philomath resident and longtime educator Jon Bartlow is part of the East Linn administrative team as the chaplain).
Unknown to Brooks, a photographer had been hired to shoot images of him during the game. Later during the association’s end-of-season banquet, he was honored and presented with photos and a basketball with his name on it. But the biggest surprise was that a Mid Valley Basketball Officials Association Hall of Fame was being established with Brooks as the first inductee.
“It looked like I was getting a Grammy or something, a really cool trophy,” Brooks said. “It was pretty humbling.”
Brooks officially leaves the position April 1 and is spending the final few weeks with routine tasks such as getting out payroll and basically just tying up loose ends. He will continue in his role as commissioner of the Mid-Valley Soccer Referees Association with a couple of years remaining on his term.
In his role as the MVBOA commissioner, Brooks attended various games to observe officials at both the varsity and junior varsity levels.
“I’m actually more interested in observing the younger officials and then giving them some feedback,” Brooks said. “Especially in the early part of the season, I want to make sure that the young officials are doing the right things, blowing their whistle … looking at their mechanics and encouraging them.”
One of the more challenging parts of officiating involves boisterous fans or overexcited coaches that sometimes can get aggressive verbally. At the beginning of each season, Brooks reminds the officials that they are consummate professionals.
“You never have the luxury of stooping to the level of the coaches or the fans, especially the fans,” he said. “You never confront the fan … and it’s so hard because you want to turn around and give it right back to them.”
There have been situations when Brooks has been sitting in the grandstands observing and a questionable call on the court comes up.
“There’ll be a call that people don’t like and I’ll just feel half of the people there looking (at me) to see if I’m going to write something down and am I going to take care of the officials for that call. Even coaches, they’ll turn around and look at me,” he said.
The Mid Valley Basketball Officials Association coverage area includes 19 schools.
“I assign all the officials to games that’s within their skill level and their locale because games are as far away as Taft and Waldport to Sweet Home and all the way in between,” Brooks said. “It’s a lot of coverage and a lot of the middle schools are in there as well so it averages well over 1,500 games a season.”
The officials are paid better nowadays and also are compensated for mileage.
“Some of these guys are making some really decent money these days,” Brooks said, adding that some officiate in multiple sports. “In basketball, gosh, I’m guessing some of these guys are making more than $6,500 for the season.”
As for numbers, the association had 82 officials this past season — a level not seen since before the pandemic — and Brooks said he still could’ve used another 10 to 15.
“When I started, I want to say there were upwards of 100,” Brooks said. “In the early ’90s, we would rarely work more than one game per night. I’d go to Waldport and work the boys JV or something and once in a while, you would do a double JV but varsity was rarely a double and now it’s the norm. I rarely will send a crew to do just one varsity game or one JV game.”
One of the most challenging parts of the job, Brooks said, is just keeping everybody happy.
“Everybody wants the big game, or what they perceive as the big game, and they want varsity games,” he said. “Most officials think that they deserve a better game than their colleagues are getting and so trying to keep 80 officials content has really been a challenge over the years and it’s not been without a lot of scars.”
Complaints get filed and situations have even risen to the level of litigation.
Another difficult part of the job is dealing with ejections — those moments when an official feels a coach or player crossed a line and issued a second technical foul in a game. Athletic directors often appeal.
Brooks said game ejections don’t happen very often, saying, “The entire season, I may have had 10 ejections of either players or coaches.”
Interestingly, this season in a playoff game, a player who was being excessively verbal was ejected.
“I’ve never seen an ejection at a state playoff game,” Brooks said. “The official was more patient than maybe I would have been and finally the guy was basically just asking for it.”
Another challenge for the commissioner and his team of officials can be the weather.
“A whole day of games will get canceled — that’s not so hard,” he said. “This year, when there were some cancellations toward the end of the season, you’ve got schools with very little time to make up those games and you’re already overbooked as it is.”
Of course, not everything about officiating has to be a challenge. Brooks said he has enjoyed the relationships and camaraderie through the years.
“You have times when you get together and there’s no game or it’s not even in basketball season but you’re just enjoying spending time with the guys,” he said. “And not just with officials but with the administration, the ADs and all of them that I’ve just known forever.”
Brooks said one of his mentors was Dean Bruce, a longtime official who was also a school teacher. In January 1997, Bruce suffered a heart attack while officiating a Boys and Girls Club basketball game at Harding Elementary in Corvallis. He was rushed to the hospital but died at age 70.
“I actually officiated his service of celebration of life,” Brooks said. “We did it at the Corvallis High School gym and there must have been 100 officials there — all wearing their stripes. He was a longtime community member, so there were a lot of people there.”
During the association’s end-of-season banquet, Brooks mentioned that his one regret was not getting into officiating sooner. Once he did get in, there was always a desire to improve.
“We tell the young guys, it’s knowing the calls and learning to blow the whistle,” Brooks said. “When you get more experience, you’re learning when to not blow the whistle and just trying to understand the spirit of the game. And that it’s not just the black-and-white of every call.”
