"Diana has been very vocal about collaboration within the league system to keep their business model viable," Kitt said. "I believe that vision really resonated with John Bratsakis and Greg Michlig, who also had that same vision."

Kitt said he determined the collaborative project could work and expand once it is up and running.

"We are very excited about this collaboration, as in the long term it can be beneficial to those leagues and associations that want to maintain their independence and improve cost and benefit structures," Dykstra said.

Based on Kitt's business analysis and many more phone conference discussions among the CEOs, the leagues have agreed in principle to establish a new cooperative CUSO-like business, including the ownership characteristics, governance model, bylaws, business plan and the core service offerings, which would manage the three leagues' back office operations.

"Collaboration is something I've thought about since I came into this industry," said Bratsakis, president/CEO of the MDCCUA. "Collaboration is something we have to do to survive in the long term."

"I think there is a great deal of potential with this collaboration that we are very excited about," said Michlig, president/CEO of the NJCUL.

The new entity will be named Plexcity. The name comes from the word plexus, which basically means network. The word is a common medical term to describe a complex network of blood vessels and nerves, according to Dictionary.com.

Kitt is now working on the due diligence details of Plexcity, which will be chartered in Nevada as a cooperative and employ 16 people. Most of them will be from the California league. A search is underway for Plexcity's office space, which will be located somewhere in southern California. The new venture's start date is tentatively set for Oct. 1.

In Plexcity's first year of operations, Kitt projected the costs would be slightly higher because of startup expenses, including standardizing IT, HR, accounting and finance processes.

"In the second year and beyond there is significant savings, and we believe 15% to 20% in overall savings is achievable and could be greater when other leagues join the cooperative," Kitt said.

"I think the objective is to keep the collaboration small, see how it goes, learn some lessons from what we have done and then scale it up from there," Kitt said. "Once we get it up and running the expectation is certainly to invite other leagues to participate."

One of the other advantages of Plexcity is that it offers an alternative to league mergers, which has been a major industry trend the last eight years. From 2007 to 2013, 16 state leagues merged. Ten formed two-state leagues and six merged to create three-state leagues. These leagues were driven to merge in part because credit union mergers have eroded league membership and program fees.

Some leagues have remained independent because they have generated new revenues through for-profit business subsidiaries and other investments. Nonetheless, leagues still need to keep lowering operational costs where they can because member and program revenues will continue to decline with ongoing credit union mergers.

Although the CEOs have agreed in principle to form Plexcity, the due diligence stage is still underway. That means the new venture could be derailed if issues arise that cannot be resolved.

"We are now working through some of the tactical details of our due diligence … developing the contract between each league and the cooperative, building the service level agreements and understanding each leagues' business environment and infrastructure," Kitt said.

"If the cooperative moves too slowly in eliminating redundant processes or the leagues fail to adapt to the news business environment, there is risk to achieving complete success," the California league executive said. "That all said, I am completely confident in our ability to exceed our owners' expectations."