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Kit Broadbelt, Pasco County's athletic director most of the past decade, is one of seven applicants to become associate commissioner of the Florida High School Athletics Association.
Broadbelt, 58, was the county athletic director from 1994 to 2001 and returned to that post last summer, supervising athletics for the county's nine high schools while working as an assistant principal at Land O'Lakes High.
He was unavailable for comment Tuesday night.
The FHSAA job, expected to be filled by July 1, is the No. 2 position for the nonprofit organization that oversees high school athletics for the state. Interviews will be conducted by outgoing commissioner Bob Hughes and John Stewart, an associate commissioner who was selected this month as Hughes' successor.
Broadbelt's coaching roots in the bay area date 30 years to his days as boys basketball coach at Tampa Catholic from 1974 to '78. He has coached at Land O'Lakes, spent time as athletic director at Zephyrhills and worked as an assistant at Saint Leo University.
Broadbelt attended the FHSAA's board of directors meeting in Tampa two weeks ago and is a regular at board meetings. He said he has done so because Pasco County superintendent John Long always has preferred to have someone from the county present to be aware of the issues facing high school athletics.
The position specifically is associate commissioner for compliance, a job vacated last month when Dan Boyd left to become superintendent of Alachua County schools. The job is scaled to pay a salary equivalent to 85 percent of the FHSAA commissioner's salary, which should put it close to $100,000.
The posting on the FHSAA's Web site required a master's degree in education with a minimum of 10 years of educational administrative background. Two other applicants have ties to the Tampa Bay area: William Grey, the director of school operations for Pinellas County schools, and Eric Allen, athletic director at Largo High School.
Hughes said last month experience as a principal or superintendent was a crucial aspect in the position because much of the job is interacting with principals across the state and being familiar with the problems they face with athletics. He also has an advantage in that he worked with Stewart three years when Stewart was deputy superintendent for Pinellas County schools.