The problem of sexual abuse in youth sports is more like a DNA marker than an acknowledged crisis. Consider the fate of the official player in this game with the tools to address it: last year’s report by the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee. In the dance of inaction that is our legislative branch these days, the recommendations of the commission have been benched by the very coaches who drafted them for their rosters. (In 2015, a Government Accountability Office audit of federal legislation governing sports abuse turned into a turgid book report that was universally ignored.)
The latest blip confirming long-proposed reforms held in a permanent holding pattern was the April sacking of Ju’Riese Colón, CEO of the U.S. Center for SafeSport. Colón was the second boss of the agency, which was set up in 2018 to adjudicate claims of abuse by coaches in Olympic sports national governing bodies. Her predecessor, Shellie Pfohl, quit in the middle of her three-year contract.
