LAUSD athletes may be stranded

If enough money isn't raised, games could be canceled – a possibility that poses a dramatic threat to sports-crazed secondary schools.

Campus athletic directors will request a $24 per-student contribution at the beginning of fall, winter and spring sports seasons. The goal is to cover $650,000 that was cut from the district's athletics transportation budget.

"If we are not successful, our only recourse would be to have to eliminate some contests – and we absolutely do not want to have to do that," said Barbara Fiege, LAUSD's director of interscholastic athletics.

The request to parents comes on the heels of a $1.4million shortfall in the sports budget that threatened stipends for nearly 600 coaches, endangering their teams' existence.