St George Illawarra have received interest from private investors wanting to buy into the famous club but Dragons officials will not consider any offers until they finalise a review of the joint venture's governance model that may pave the way for members to gain voting rights.
As revealed by Fairfax Media in December, St George Illawarra are considering privatisation as funding of the game shifts from traditional leagues club funding to broadcast revenue since the $1 billion TV deal negotiated by the NRL in 2013.
Dragons chief executive Peter Doust said directors acknowledged after more than 15 years of being run by a combined St George and Illawarra board it was time to consider a new structure but change would only be made if it was in the best interests of the club.
Contrary to the widely held perception of the club's financial situatiuon, Doust said St George Illawarra were not broke but had gone to the NRL in 2013 seeking assistance to ensure the club would be strong in the future, and their business plan forecasts a profit in 2017 - something only two clubs achieved last season.
However, the club was open to change and has been looking at alternative governance models, includng that of South Sydney, which is 75 per cent owned by Russell Crowe and James Packer, with members controlling the other 25 per cent.
"Of the 16 clubs in the NRL and all of their membership programs, there is only one club that has member voting rights and that is South Sydney," Doust said. "We have been looking at that but there are various ways of doing it. There is the Brisbane Broncos model, we could develop a community-based model, there is the clarity of the Souths experience, and there is a modification of what we have now that would see St George and the Steelers have a place in the future as well. How it all fits together with the best interests of the game and the brand, we have been doing some due diligence on that, and that includes the voting rights of the members.
"This is not new, we are doing it because we saw some 12 months ago ... that the time was right to review our governance model because the stability and the consistency of the joint venture agreement in the past had delivered us to a certain point. We believe we need to have a more contempary model and if it involves members as such we are looking into the way that can be achieved to provide independent qualifications to our board and our stewardship to make sure it is representative of our stakeholders, but it protects the traditions and the history of this club into the future."
Doust confirmed there had already been interest from private investors but the Dragons board did not believe there was any need to rush into any decision after managing to avoid the internal conflicts that have affected some other clubs for the first 17 seasons of the joint venture's history.
"There are people who have expressed interest from various locations but you don't want to be rushing to that solution because it is popular, you want to make sure it is structured in the right way," he said. "You have got to be careful who you invite in and we are going to be careful. We have been here for a long time with a lot of rich history and tradition and we don't think we have got to make a decision in two weeks about how we should govern in the future. We are advanced but there is nothing we could put on the table at the moment to say it is going to be this or it is going to be by then. We have got a commitment around our board table to get it happening and we have got the support of the NRL to look into it but we are not wanting to change too rapidly because our consistency and stability has been one of our strengths."
