Western Pennsylvania Youth Football League trying to figure out finances amid embezzlement accusations
A youth football league is trying to figure out if and how much money may be missing from their account after getting fraud alerts on it. The league's director has resigned.
With more than 40 teams, the Western Pennsylvania Youth Football League is one of the largest in the area. They had to have an emergency meeting Wednesday night to get a new director, and now begins the process of trying to access their own bank accounts.
Football season is still months away, but for team representatives like Burgettstown's Chris Havelka, they've been hit by a blindside blitz.
"Everybody is scrambling right now and doing anything they can to make sure that we're going to play football," Havelka said.
The WPYFL learned during their emergency meeting Wednesday of embezzlement accusations against the league director. KDKA-TV is not naming him because he's not facing any charges at this point, but he allegedly told a rep he "f'd up."
According to meeting minutes, some reps feel there should be around $300,000 in the account but believe it may only be $170,000 to $200,000, but they are unsure as the account is frozen and only the director can access it. The league treasurer was taken off the account in 2019, leaving just the director on it.
"We don't know what's in the account, what's not in the account. Nobody really knows much," Havelka said.
The money in the account comes from teams raising money and game gate fees. It's used to put on special games for the kids, who range in age from kindergarten to sixth grade, along with paying referees. There's now a rush to get access to the league account. During the emergency meeting, a new director and treasurer were elected.
"We want the kids to have a place to play, and make sure that going forward, we are going to play football when football season comes," Havelka said.
As for individual teams' accounts, Havelka says those were not impacted.
At this point, the league said they still have a lot to figure out. Some of that does include whether charges will have to be filed or not.
