My understanding is that clubs use the money to pay for the referees' hotels that come from out of town.

Thanks for sharing - I absolutely hate the hotel rules for events, especially since COVID when our club moved away from team travel. It wasn't too bad then when the players were sharing rooms and their were a handful of parent chaperones.

But, since then, we as parents are on the hook to stay at the "selected" hotel. There have been several times that we have booked the minimum number of rooms and nights and then gone elsewhere whether it's a better hotel, location, VRBO, etc.

What was going on in the article you shared was pretty underhanded with a clear conflict.

You mean that money doesn't go towards helping poor kids have more access to youth sports? I am shocked.