By PAT NEWMAN
Staff Writer

Fayette County High School band members and their parents should decide early next week whether to accept an offer to play at the 2000 Summer Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia.

“We decided to wait another week,” said Kenny Beard, FCHS band director.

New developments over the dispute involving Fayette County's band and approximately 1,300 other students from the U.S. and Japan, who were originally planning to play at the Games' opening ceremonies, prompted Beard and his group to wait and see what happens.

According to a recent story in The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney's Olympic Organizing Committee was informed that students cut from the opening ceremonies had a right to sue. The location of an office of the Sydney Olympic Broadcasting Organization in Utah legally allows American band members to instigate legal action against the organizing committee. The committee chief executive Sandy Hollway also stated in the article that American band members could anticipate a refund or a price reduction in the trip fee if they agreed to accept his committee's offer to play at alternate venues.

Fayette County High School band is the only remaining American group still considering an offer to participate in the games. Walton High School in Cobb County and the California schools have pulled out of the trip organized by World Projects Corp. The newspaper states that legal action has been taken by World Projects to force the Sydney Olympic Committee to either uphold its contract with the bands to perform at the opening games or pay them damages.

“We're hoping to make a decision by Aug. 9,” Beard said. “We lost the opening games, but they (Olympic Committee) came back with a really good thing,” he said. The proposal includes the band playing at the Sydney Opera House and additional venues. Beard is upbeat about the offer, and says it provides a good educational experience for the students.

“Each family will be polled individually,” Beard added, explaining how the band will reach a consensus.

The Olympic Committee's decision to revoke an invitation to 1,500 students, described as “foreign nationals” to perform in the opening ceremony, sparked an international incident. The Australians felt the American and Japanese musicians far outnumbered those from Australia and the other nations participating in the Games.