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BOSTON — Lawmakers are questioning whether youth sports should be regulated. Informational hearings this week came as big money pours into specialized youth sports with no oversight or basic safety regulations. 
In sports there is always a governing body, the MIAA in high school and the NCAA in college. When it comes to youth sports, there is no oversight. A group of Massachusetts legislators is wondering if that should change.
“This is staring us in the face that something is wrong, and it feels like there is some kind of reluctance to grapple with it," said Linda Flanagan, a former coach and the author of Take Back the Game: How Money and Mania Are Ruining Kids’ Sports.
Youth sports are big business, as much as $30 billion a year according to the Aspen Institute. With kids starting to specialize in sports younger and younger, injuries are up and participation is down.
"Youth Sports really isn’t operating at peak efficiency because we aren’t focused on the children in front of us. Right now, about 43% of kids stop playing their sport by high school," said Jon Soloman of the Aspen Institute. 
An informational hearing was held at the State House this week to look at the possibility of state oversight on youth sports as a way to create some basic guidelines. Some suggestions included limits on hours of play in a week to limit injuries and mandatory training for coaches to ensure they know basic first aid, and to prevent abuse.
Critics of the idea say parents should be the ones looking out for what is best for their kids.
"There needs to be, in the absence of some sort of regulations, something that would hold all organizations to an equal standard," said Flanagan. "Or I just don’t see how this is going to change."
There is no current legislation on the books, but some legislators from Eastern Massachusetts are looking at putting together an exploratory council to see what that would look like.

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