BLOOMINGTON - In an ongoing dispute over selling photographs taken at state high school athletic events, a photographer for The Pantagraph was denied access to the media area for Saturday's Illinois High School Association's Competitive Cheerleading Championships. | Photo gallery | Video

The IHSA and several members of the media, including The Pantagraph, are involved in a legal dispute over whether the IHSA has a right to regulate the use of news photos and videos taken by Illinois newspapers and other news media.

The IHSA has its own contract with Wisconsin-based Visual Image Photography for the production of exclusive photos and video of IHSA events.

On Saturday, Pantagraph photographer Carlos T. Miranda was not allowed to shoot photos from the floor of the cheerleading competition because he declined to sign an IHSA agreement that prohibits the sale of photo reprints.

Anthony Holman, IHSA's assistant executive director, said Miranda could take photos from the stands if he purchased a ticket for the event. Photos used in today's Pantagraph were taken from the audience after Miranda bought a ticket.

Parents and others in the audience were allowed to take photos and video of the competition.

"They can take as many photos as they want," Holman said.

In November, the IHSA banned several photographers, including most photographers from The Pantagraph, from taking photos on the field at state championship football games.

A pending lawsuit filed in Sangamon County by the Illinois Press Association asks the court to end the IHSA requirement that media agree not to sell images taken at events.

A proposed bill making its way through the Illinois General Assembly also addresses the photo issue. If approved, the new law would recognize media photos as products owned by newspapers and outside the control of other parties.

"The bulwark of our very existence is our relationship to our communities, and the IHSA seeks to control that relationship for its own commercial purposes. That's just wrong," said Dave Bennett, executive director of the press association.

Bennett previously said the IPA does not believe the VIP contract gives the IHSA the right to exclude newspapers from equal access or to control the use of news photos.

In a statement posted on the organization's Web site, the IHSA termed the proposed legislation "an end run around the judicial system."

The bill has far-reaching implications for the IHSA, executive director Marty Hickman argued. If the IHSA lost exclusive control of the right to video, for example, it may choose not to broadcast live coverage of boys' football championship games.

"It is clear this bill will lead to reducing our services or passing on increased costs to our member schools while newspapers and other media profit," Hickman said.