I once served as a member of Penn State’s Board of Trustees. For 12 years. From 1988 to 2000. That seems like a long time ago.
But it has been a long time since I have seen both the Penn State administration and the leadership of the Board of Trustees display as much incompetence, arrogance and downright contempt for the people they are supposed to be serving as I have seen and heard over the past four months.
It begins Jan. 21, when President Neeli Bendapudi and Margo DelliCarpini, vice president for commonwealth campuses, addressed the Faculty Senate. Both talked of falling enrollment and the need to cut Commonwealth Campus budgets by $54 million, with President Bendapudi clearly conveying her conclusion that, to quote an email from PSU Media Relations, “the current Commonwealth Campus structure . . . is not sustainable now or into the future.”
Quite understandably, faculty representatives from Commonwealth Campuses were taken aback: Were some campuses to be closed and faculty laid off? However, they were to learn nothing. According to the press report, both the president and the vice president refused multiple requests to “directly answer employees’ questions about possible campus closures.” In fact, the headline to the article reporting all this screams “Penn State faculty fear the school will close campuses across the state. Officials won’t give them a straight answer.”
Now, I ask you: Is this any way for Penn State officials to behave?
But it gets worse.
Clearly Bendapudi and DelliCarpini had come to that Faculty Senate meeting unprepared. When they told the senate that something had to be done about the Commonwealth Campuses, it appeared they really had no idea what they were talking about. So they presumably went back to their staff to ask: What’s the story? What are the facts? Are we actually going to close some campuses? Which ones? And why?
Over the next month, it seems, Bendapudi’s staff worked up some of the numbers. So, by Feb. 25, President Bendapudi could announce that the staff had narrowed down the list to 12 campuses under consideration for closure. Unfortunately, however, President Bendapudi’s staff just did not know yet which of the 12, or even how many of the 12, would be recommended for closure.
Well you can imagine that several thousand faculty at all 12 of these campuses were horrified, worried, upset and, indeed, downright scared for the future of their families. No one at any of these 12 campuses knew whether they would soon be out of a job. A black cloud of uncertainty settled over Penn State.
Eventually, Bendapudi got around to naming the officials who would actually figure out what the university was going to do about its Commonwealth Campuses. These were three vice presidents: DellaCarpini, Michael Wade Smith, and Tracy Langkilde.
It is unclear when these officials finally did their homework and decided which campuses would be recommended for closing. But apparently by May 7 enough was known that the Board of Trustees announced that it was scheduling a meeting for mid-May to vote on approving the closures.
Now what is absolutely shocking to an old-timer like me is that both president Bendapudi and Board Chairman David Kleppinger jointly decided that the public should not know which campuses were slated for closing until the final vote by the Board of Trustees closing them.
Think about that for a second; no, think about that for the rest of your life. The two highest people in charge of Penn State insisted that no one should be allowed to know what is in the recommendation on closing campuses, until the Board votes on it, until after it is final.
Now, I am not making this up. Let me tell you what happened next, for then you shall know just how low the leadership of Penn State can sink.
On or before May 12, someone leaked the names of the campuses that were to be recommended for closure to the Philadelphia Inquirer. It turns out, the number was seven: Dubois, Fayette, Mont Alto, New Kensington, Shenango, Wilkes-Barre and York.
How did Penn State officials react? They thought it was terrible that any information regarding the closures should get out prior to the Board of Trustees discussing it at a meeting closed to the public, and then voting on it a few days later.
“I am truly sorry that our community is learning of the recommendation through media coverage, rather than hearing about it with additional context directly from me or the board,” said Bendapudi. “I understand the concern this will cause on our campuses until the decision is finalized.”
Think about what she just said: She did not want the community to hear anything about the recommendation “until the decision is finalized.” In other words, she wants those affected by the closures to have no knowledge of, and no voice in, the decision until after the Board of Trustees votes on it.
The chairman of the Board of Trustees, David Kleppinger, says it even more repulsively: “I find it deeply frustrating that someone with early access to this recommendation decided to share it with the media with absolutely no regard for how this information would impact members of our campus communities. Our students, faculty and staff deserve better.”
The perversity of this statement is mind-blowing. First, any normal person would want those who are to be impacted by a decision to know what is being decided. Second, Kleppinger has the gall to say he is “frustrated” that someone would want to share information with those who would be impacted by it. Finally, he believes our faculty and staff deserve to be kept in the dark!
Speaking of keeping people in the dark, the leadership of our Board of Trustees is becoming expert at keeping the public and the media out of meetings. Not only did the board chairman want no information to get out before the meeting at which it will be voted on, but he also scheduled the meeting at which the full information about the recommended closures was to be presented to be conducted in “executive session,” This means closed to the public, closed to the media and most especially closed to the people who will be impacted.
Now the Pennsylvania Open Meetings Law was enacted to make sure that policy decisions such as the closure of public university campuses would be discussed in public. There is even a pending lawsuit brought by Spotlight PA to enjoin the Penn State Board of Trustees from conducting its business in closed meeting. But the board just ignores statutes and lawsuits whenever it suits them.
Someday, someone who truly loves Penn State will sit down and read Pennsylvania’s Open Meetings Law. For, there they shall come across a most interesting provision, section 714, which states:
(a) Fines and costs. Any member of any agency who participates in a meeting with the intent and purpose by that member of violating this chapter commits a summary offense and shall, upon conviction, be sentenced to pay:
(1) For a first offense, the costs of prosecution plus a fine of at least $100 and, in the discretion of the sentencing authority, of not more than $1,000.
(2) For a second or subsequent offense, the costs of prosecution plus a fine of at least $500 and, in the discretion of the sentencing authority, of not more than $2,000. (b) Payment.–An agency shall not make a payment on behalf of or reimburse a member of an agency for a fine or cost resulting from the member’s violation of this section.
If I did not live more than a thousand miles away from State College, I think I would be at the District Magistrate’s office tomorrow morning filling out summary offense complaints to be served on all the voting members of the board who attended the closed meeting on May 15, and who also did not object to the fact that the meeting was closed to the public and the media. But, alas, someone else will have to be the hero who brings the law to Penn State’s Board of Trustees.
In any event, this old-timer thinks that David Kleppinger and Neeli Bendapudi are bringing great shame on our beloved University. I hope there are still some hearts out there who love Penn State’s name enough to be as shocked as I am by their courses of conduct.
Ben Novak (’65, ‘99g) is a Penn State alumnus and former member of the university’s Board of Trustees.
