The National Academy of Public Administration (N.A.P.A.) and the Peter G. Peterson Foundation hoped to start a new pastime this Sunday with the first annual Budgetball tournament, a new sport designed to educate players about responsible budgeting and the country’s growing debt. Though that's a rather serious description for a game modeled on Ultimate Frisbee and played with a volleyball, the tournament was void of competition and planners instead focused on keeping things fun for the 200 policy wonks and budget geeks who turned out to play and watch in the shadow of the Washington Monument.
“It’s physical and fiscal,” said N.A.P.A. senior director of civic engagement Bryna Helfer, who handled the logistics of the tournament. Helfer said her biggest challenges in organizing the event were the six-week process of reserving a spot on the National Mall and convincing players to join in for a game that they had never heard of before.
Helfer helped recruit eight teams from organizations involved in fiscal policy, including the U.S. Department of Treasury, the House Budget Committee, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Urban Institute. N.A.P.A. also organized exhibition Budgetball tournaments at the University of Miami and Philander Smith College in Little Rock earlier this year; the Peterson Foundation arranged for travel for the winning teams from those schools to compete in Sunday’s tournament.
Developed by N.A.P.A. in collaboration with Parsons the New School for Design and professional game developer Area/Code, Budgetball consists of eight-minute periods of play and with three-minute strategy sessions designed to simulate managing assets, in which players can choose to spend their "budgetbucks" on potential advantages for scoring points, or earn bucks via "sacrifices" that make it harder to score, like wearing oven mitts or plastic inner tubes.
“One you start playing, it’s really easy,” Helfer promised. If any casual observers had trouble following the play on the field, they could snack on chips in one of the spectators' tents, get a free ice cream from the Good Humor cart, or check out Budgetball-branded freebies like sunglasses and mini Budgetballs.
In the end, brawn triumphed over brains, with the tournament’s two college teams beating out the Washington establishment to make it to the finals. The University of Miami’s team won the championship, proving to be the victors in fiscal responsibility.
