The NCAA says they are rethinking their tournament host cities, looking to avoid holding events in locations with poor LGBT laws and policies.
This comes in the wake of controversies around the NCAA’s men’s Final Fours taking place in Indianapolis earlier this year and in Houston next spring. Indiana passed an RFRA law allowing business owners to refuse service to gay customers and Houston voters recently overturned their city’s LGBT non-discrimination ordinance, known as HERO.
The RFRA laws in Indiana provoked a response from NCAA President Mark Emmert.
“We’re very serious about our core values and we want to make sure we can operate in an environment that is supportive of those values, so this is a very serious issue for us,” Emmert said in an interview with ESPN.
The NCAA, which is headquartered in Indianapolis, also released a statement saying they would “closely examine the implications” of the law.
They are once again reiterating the importance of equality in deciding their future tournament locations, although they have already said that they will not move the Final Four scheduled for Houston in the spring.
“We’ll continue to review current events in all cities bidding on NCAA championships and events, as well as cities that have already been named as future host sites, such as Indianapolis,” Bob Williams, NCAA senior vice president for communications, told the Indianapolis Star in an email earlier this month. Read Full at Goqnotes.com
