WADR to you and the excellent service you provide the game, and accepting the US is a LARGE country... thats just ridiculous.
Context - I live in Springfield, which is about 200mi outside of Chicago, and I've been with the Chicago society since 2013. I was actually at the AGM where the Illinois RFU folded in Feb 2013. After that meeting, I reached out to a former referee coach, and he advised me to go with Chicago over Missouri due to the opportunities for growth/development, and I don't regret it for a second (more on that below).
Due to the dearth of referees in my latitudinal area of the state (we just added a second last year), clubs in Peoria (350mi RT from Chi/130 for me), Bloomington-Normal (260/120), Champaign-Urbana (270/160), and Georgetown (310/170) go through the Chicago society for referees. I usually get first crack at those games, but it's also not fair for those teams to have the same ref multiple times per season, so there are some weekends where I'm heading north and another referee is heading south. Over the years, the assigners have done a good job of striking that balance, and if it's going to be a tight/competitive game (Peoria has made the knockouts several years running), they usually send one of the higher-level referees down and get me a challenging game up north.
I can't even imagine the expenses card submitted after the match!
Just mileage door-to-door, and expenses are logged and reimbursed by yours truly (I have been the Chicago referee treasurer since 2020)
If you really want eye-popping expense reports, I can show you travel expense reports from Midwest referees (I've been treasurer since 2018) - in the fall, there are games in
Minneapolis
St Louis
Kansas City
Chicago
Detroit
Cincinnati
Cleveland
Pittsburgh
Madison
and referees flying in from as far away as Memphis, Nashville, and Fargo.
Are you Liverpool or Manchester? (I'm Liverpool)
