Aristide Economopoulos/The Star-LedgerWayne Valley quarterback Derrick Bligh, left, looks to throw in the North Jersey, Section 1, Group 3 final in November.

Competitive balance between schools? Got that, too.

How about shortening travel - and creating local rivalries? It's in there.

The governing body of high school sports in New Jersey - in an attempt to fix all these problems and more - released a proposal Tuesday that would create six super conferences involving more than 200 high schools in Central and North Jersey.

Here are some links to other stories regarding the alignment.

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The proposal, created by a 34-member Leagues and Conferences Realignment Committee formed by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA), will create super conferences based on county lines with divisions based on enrollment.

Michael Hughes, a co-chairman on the committee and the principal at North Hunterdon High School, said the committee had three goals:

‡ To fix geographical problems (some current conferences have teams from as many as four different counties) to create more regional rivalries and limit transportation costs;

‡ To address competitive balance issues between public and non-public schools that have led to contentious relationships between schools in recent years;

‡ To create a flexible schedule program that will enable schools to choose more of their opponents rather than being locked into large division schedules.

Hughes, however, stressed that the proposal is just that, a proposal -- and that the committee would welcome suggestions and feedback until Sept. 2. The plan is scheduled to be put up for a vote of the full membership of the NJSIAA on Sept. 10.

If passed, the plan could be implemented by as soon as the 2009-10 school year.

"Our goal was to come up with a plan that would have fair competition for all schools," Hughes said. "This is not a perfect plan, but a working plan. This is going to be a two- to four-year pilot program."

Schools in Monmouth, Middlesex and Mercer counties and to the south will not be affected by the plan.

"We came to the conclusion that some of the state was fine," Hughes said.

That's not the case in Northern New Jersey, where acrimony between public and non-public schools in the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League led to a Dec. 3 proposal to divide the state into public and non-public leagues. When that voted failed by just eight votes, the NJSIAA realized the issue of competitive balance was felt statewide, not just in the NNJIL.

The public schools in the NNJIL, saying they were tired of being overwhelmed competitively by non-public schools -- especially in football -- threatened to secede from the conference and the NJSIAA after the vote failed, 186-178. This plan is an attempt to solve that problem.

It is unclear whether it will.

Under this proposal, public schools still will be forced to play non-public powerhouses in their league. The committee, however, said they made divisions small enough that schools could fill out their schedule with more competitive games.

"With the powerhouse teams, we divided them up into divisions that would enable them to schedule more open games," Hughes said. "They have five or six teams in their division and then they can schedule their own other games after those."

In other words, teams would still have to face the powerhouses, but only once.

Steve Jenkins, the athletic director at Bloomfield -- one of the NNJIL schools that threatened to leave the NJSIAA -- wasn't totally pleased with the proposal. And he sat on the committee.

"Philosophically, I am a separationist," he said. "Short of separation, this is the best we could do."

Another committee member, Mike Van Zile, was more upbeat.

Van Zile, the recently retired athletic director at Wallkill Valley who had two of his realignment plans fail to pass, hopes this one will.

"Those people who are set in their ways will have a hard time with it, but if they give it a chance, it can be positive for everyone," he said. "Most of all, it will be fair for the student-athletes."

Football powers Don Bosco Prep, St. Peter's Prep, Bergen Catholic and St. Joseph of Montvale all are in different leagues -- which is fine with Rich Hanson, the St. Peter's head coach and athletic director.

"To be honest, something had to be done about realignment because it had been inequitable at times," he said. "I was against some things initially, but the more I looked at it from all aspects I saw it was the best thing for all schools.

"The best thing is that it's only a two- or three-year deal, so we can see how it works. If it doesn't play out and create competitive balance, then maybe something more radical will have to happen, like completely separating the publics and non-publics. I think this can work and I think it's a good plan."

The committee said it used the Shore Conference, which divides schools in Monmouth and Ocean counties, as a guide to create the six super conferences:

The committee did not break up Conference 5 and 6 (encompassing Union, Somerset, Hunterdon and Warren counties) into divisions, but it did combine them into a super football conference of 40 schools, divided into four divisions. It feels those divisions could be used as a guide for dividing the conferences in other sports.

The committee consisted of 34 principals, superintendents and athletic directors from around the state and was chaired by two former NJSIAA presidents: Hughes and Hackensack School District Superintendent Joseph Montesano.