The question shouldn't be whether the state Department of Education should cut most junior varsity and some varsity sports to save an estimated $1 million.

Of course it shouldn't. Rather, the question that should be posed is how do we get as much bang for our tax dollars in every other area as junior varsity sports programs and their coaches provide for that $1 million?

When you consider that the DOE spends $4.2 million of its $2.3 billion state appropriation on athletics, sports, particularly at the JV level, have been a blue-light bargain special. They are something to be emulated, not eliminated.

The JV programs provide a well-timed alternative to some of our most at-risk youngsters at the vulnerable mid-teen ages. They offer options to delinquency, encouragement to stay in school and an introduction to physical fitness.

People knowledgeable in high school athletics will tell you that in terms of reaching — and teaching — teens the JV level might be more valuable than varsity. In Hawai'i, where there are few intermediate-age programs, JV does double duty and, for the money, does it well.

These are challenging economic times for the state, when austerity is the order of the day. But cutting sports, as easy as that might be in the short term, all but promises problems later on. If even a fraction of the 6,000 students who it is said would be impacted in 2009-10 by dropping JV programs are detoured before they end up in the justice system, the state will save its $1 million several times over. Likewise for an active lifestyle that promotes health and lessens burdens on the healthcare system.

Where would you rather allocate tax money, to sports or expanding the legal and health systems to take care of people who could have been helped earlier?

The suggestion of cuts in athletics carries with it more than a bit of irony for officials, this year in particular when we are saluting some prized graduates.

Want to talk about public school graduates and inspirations? Bryan Clay, Natasha Kai, Clay Stanley, Dean Wilson and Jordon Dizon — three Olympians, a pro golfer and a football player — only scratch the surface on those who have come out of the public schools to make names for themselves — and Hawai'i — on the national and international stages of late.

That's why, for all the public handwringing, you have to wonder if the DOE hasn't recognized this full well and sought to make political hay. You suspect it could have aired out the possibility of cutting sports partly as an incendiary measure. Something to light a fire of public indignation big enough to cause Gov. Linda Lingle to reexamine the size of the hit laid on the DOE.

To be sure, it worked in 2003 when sports budget cuts were the order of the day.

Now, five years later, almost to the day, high school sports is ostensibly back under review, just about the last place it should be when you are talking about value.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.