Michigan Marching Band Petition
While it probably won't change anything, the least we can do is try to fight Brandon's insanity. Someone created a petition on change.org to get the band to travel to Dallas. Sign the petition below, join the resistance!
http://www.youtube.com/v/3YztgdsnvsU?version=3&feature=player_detailpage
will do nothing to make change for DB. However, the cost of signing it is nothing too. So the risk/reward is favorable.
This petition reminds me of the old "duck and cover" drills we used to do in school. For those of you under 35, we would all hide under our desk and cover our face in the case of a nuclear detonation, (Like that is going to help). Then years later, FMEA admitted the "duck and cover" campaign was initiated to give the illusion that we could survive an attack when FMEA knew full well we could not.
I still get minor PTSD-type symptoms whenever I see the Fallout Shelter symbol on old buildings. I hated those things. After ducking under our school desks to survive the initial blast, we were supposed to then high-tail it to the nearest Fallout Shelter to wait out the apocalypse. Crazy times.
Maybe it's time for a compromise. Let the band pay for the football teams travel expenses and the athletic department will pick up the tab for the band.
If, as others have pointed out, the band pays its own way to away games, and they generally do about two a year, why is it that for this game the athletic department is supposed to pay.
Wait a minute, why don't we start a better one and sign it. We're only giving up 1k signatures on a quest for 400k This dude is whacked a little bit.
it's at 1000 and and continuing to grow whenever I refresh. Hopefully we can get more people to know about it.
#FreeMMB
Will sign petition after the Caps game
I do have to admit that 400K seems like a lot to spend for the band to get to the game. Why so much?
Figure 200 members (Is this right? I have no idea). 4 people to a room, for 2 nights in Dallas. This is 50 hotel rooms for 2 nights = 100 x $100 (per night rate) = $10,000.
Then chartering a bus is about $800 per day, plus most companies charge another per-mile rate, like $1-2 per mile. For four days, that would be $800x4 + $4400 (2200 miles total) = $7,600 per bus. You'd need 3 buses, so $22,800.
Give the kids $30 per day for food x 4 x 200 = $24,000.
So total is about 40 grand. How can I be off by a factor of 10?
First, you're looking at more like 400 when it's all said and done. Then, they're talking about flying, which likely means chartering a 737 from Metro to DFW; I have no idea how expensive that is, but a Gulfstream runs like $12,500 an hour and a 737 is considerably bigger with a ton more weight. On top of that, they need to send one or two semi trucks worth of equipment down to Dallas, feed the band when they're in town, pay for hotel rooms, charter a bus once they're there and probably rent a place to practice.
Softball trips with flights can easily top $20,000, and you're talking about a group twenty times the size of a softball team. I don't doubt it gets really expensive really quickly.
Wasn't there an article on ESPN about two months ago saying Michigan is one of the top 5 most profitable athletic departments in the country? Definitely signed by me and at least a two dozen friends in Tallahassee, Florida....and my friends are Seminole fans, by the way.