Friday, January 20, 2012

PSU Trustees say no apologies nor significant changes


If the appearance of impropriety is often worse than the original actions, the Penn State's Board of Trustees looks worse and worse by the day.  A few observations about this article where select Trustees announced no apologies - no changes.

  • When the Trustees met, not all had read the Grand Jury presentment  "It depends on where we were on Saturday if we had access to the presentment,” Riley said.  That's funny, because I read the presentment on the Internet the day it came out...November 4th.  

  • The Trustees kept no minutes at the meeting where they fired Paterno.  You have a governance meeting where you take personnel actions in response to a legal crisis and you choose not to record the minutes.  That's going to open up a whole other can of legal worms.

  • Cynthia Baldwin is another interesting character...her role needs to be explored more.  She was a Trustee before resigning to take a position as PSU Counsel (a highly unethical move to begin with).  She acted as attorney to Shultz and Curley at their arraignment and has since resigned to spend more time with family.  Hmmmm....

  • They fired Paterno for failing to report yet according to Eckel;"In the end, though, the board did not dismiss Spanier for failing to keep them informed."  Wow...Spanier, Curley and Shultz were not terminated for failing to report, just Paterno.

What's clear is that the Trustees used the firing of Paterno as a way to deflect attention from the real questions: the failure of governance, the cozy business relationships with people like Baldwin, the instinctive covering for people like Spanier.  It appears the university has learned nothing and thus it keeps this story alive.

One suspects facts will continue to drip, drip, drip out and cause further pain to those who fervently believe in the "Penn State Way".  It's going to get worse....much, much worse

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