According to records gathered from the NEIU Controllers Office, the Chicago Rockstars of the American Basketball Association appear to have had two checks written to NEIU that equal $7,000 returned for lack of payment.
The Rockstars were under contract for the rental of the P.E Complex for $2,500 per game night. The checks that were rejected were dated Dec. 12 for $4,500 and Jan. 16 for $2,500. When the checks will be paid back is still in question.
Team owner Marques Sullivan refused to answer questions on the checks stating, “I will not answer any questions regarding financial issues with the NEIU student newspaper.”
Matt Specht of Campus Recreation, who helped negotiate the Rockstars contract with NEIU, also declined to directly address the issue; saying “I don’t care to comment on the Rockstars financial situation.”
The Rockstars were initially scheduled to play 16 home games at NEIU. They came to the campus because the stadium complex they were originally scheduled to play in at Chicago State University was under construction.
The Rockstars ended their season early in February due to unspecified reasons and said they are looking for a new league to play in.
According to Vice President of Finance and Administration Mark Wilcockson, most of the money charged to the Rockstars “Was used to support operations of the Recreation Center for the games.” About $1,200 was estimated to cover this, while $1,300 went to the campus general fund.
Wilcockson also talked about the process the university has available to them to collect on the checks. The first step involves contacting the vendor in question to find out their intent on payment; in many cases the vendor does not even know the check was returned for non-payment.
The second step in collecting the money involves the State Comptrollers Offset System. It is a system where a state institution can contact the state and find out whether the vendor is owed any money by the state such as a tax refund; the university can then garnish the amount of bad debt from the tax refund.
Wilcockson said, “Last time I talked to Campus Recreation, the checks had not been paid but they [Rockstars] had the intention to do that. If they don’t they can then proceed to step two.”