Andrew Wolfson, The Courier-Journal:
Under her watch, …university employees have stole[n], misspent or mishandled at least $7.6 million in schemes at the health science campus, the law school, the business school and the athletic department’s ticket office.
[Provost Shirley] Willihnganz also was criticized for approving about $1 million in buyouts for former high-ranking employees, some of which included agreements not to disparage the university or its leaders.
She also was forced to apologize to faculty in 2008 for failing to act against [Robert] Felner, the education dean, despite more than 30 grievances and complaints that he had intimidated, harassed, humiliated and retaliated against faculty, staff, students and alumni.
Willihnganz said at the time that she tended to dismiss the early complaints against Felner — including a no-confidence vote by faculty — because he was a “high performer” and because the complaints came from professors and staff “entrenched in their ways and resistant to change.”
She later told faculty at a meeting that she was sorry. “Mostly what I think I want to say is people have been hurt and something very bad happened, and as provost I feel like I am ultimately responsible for that,” she said.
Felner was sentenced in 2010 to 63 months in federal prison for taking $2.3 million from U of L and the University of Rhode Island.
Ave atque vale!
April 30th, 2015 at 2:38PM
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