Re: Keith Masser's farewell speech, Ira Lubert's appointment.
Here is what I shared with Philly.com and alumni networking sites.
"In his final remarks as chairman, Masser reflected on a tenure that began in January 2013. He said the arguments surrounding the scandal and its aftermath are signs of progress."
Keith Masser IS the scandal, or at least a central part of it. His conduct as a Board member helped create it in November 2011, when he and his colleagues admitted effectively on Penn State’s behalf that Penn State had somehow condoned or facilitated Jerry Sandusky’s actions. His subsequent dishonesty and dereliction of his fiduciary duty (as shown below) as a Board member and then Chairman aggravated it enormously. State Senator Yudichak described his conduct as "egregious," and Judge Pellegrini of the Commonwealth Court opined in effect that the Board, as led by Karen Peetz and then Keith Masser, was derelict in its fiduciary duty to challenge the NCAA sanctions. http://www.pacourts.us/assets/opinions/Commonwealth/out/1MD13_4-9-14.pdf?cb=1 (April 9 2014) Page 37. Note that the dissenting judge is bewildered, like the majority, how the Board could have approved the consent decree.
"The majority appears to arrive at this outcome because it is bewildered, as I am, by how the Board of Trustees of PSU could have approved or allowed to be executed a “Consent Decree” involving the expenditure of $60 million of PSU funds when the Consent Decree specifically states that the matter “ordinarily would not be actionable by the NCAA.” If, as the majority suggests, the NCAA did not have jurisdiction over conduct because it did not involve the regulation of athletics, then the expenditure of those funds is problematic, given that PSU is a non-profit corporation as well as being tax-exempt as a charitable organization, and that Boards of Directors of non-profit charitable corporations have a fiduciary duty to ensure that funds are only used for matters related to its charitable purpose – in this case, the students of PSU. See 15 Pa. C.S. §5712. Moreover, the majority position is understandable given the lax supervision by those responsible for insuring that non-profit and charitable organizations operate as non-profit and charitable organizations as well as their failure to take action against Boards of Directors and Officers who use funds of a non-profit and/or charitable entity to pay funds that they are not legally obligated to pay and/or expend funds not related to their charitable purpose or who no longer act as a charity. See Zampogna v. Law Enforcement Health Benefits, Inc., 81 A.3d 1043, 1047 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2013)."
Masser also lied to and on behalf of Penn State about the circumstances of Coach Paterno's dismissal, as did Ira Lubert and Mark Dambly.
Here is what Mr. Masser, Mr. Lubert, Mr. Dambly, and their colleagues such as Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier and BNY Mellon President Karen Peetz told the public, and the organization to which they owed a fiduciary duty, in March 2012. "Unanimous" makes every single Board member at that time equally responsible as a party to this statement, as in the “tolerate those who do” portion of the U.S. Military Academy’s Honor Code.
"While Coach Paterno did his legal duty by reporting that information the next day, Sunday, March 3, to his immediate superior, the then Penn State Athletic Director Tim Curley, the Board reasonably inferred that he did not call police. We determined that his decision to do his minimum legal duty and not to do more to follow up constituted a failure of leadership by Coach Paterno. …At about 9 pm, we unanimously made the difficult decision that Coach Paterno’s failure of leadership required his removal as football coach."
Now, here is what Mr. Masser had to say when he was under oath in the Corman versus NCAA lawsuit. “The decision to remove Coach Paterno had nothing to do with what he had known, what he hadn’t done. It was based upon the distraction of having him on the sidelines would have caused the university and the current football team harm. It had nothing to do with what Coach Paterno had done, or hadn’t done.”
If Paterno was fired for public relations reasons, and not for anything he had or had not done, he was not fired for failure of leadership. This makes every single Board member as of March 2012 a liar; the kind of person with character, ethics, and integrity defects whom the U.S. Military Academy washes out very quickly because a liar cannot command, and does not deserve, the trust, respect, or confidence of subordinates, peers, superiors, and other organizational stakeholders. This includes, by the way, former Penn State President Rodney Erickson and ex-Governor Tom Corbett as ex officio members.
How somebody like Ira Lubert is going to credibly represent Penn State to its students, alumni, faculty, employees, and the State Legislature is beyond me.
William A. Levinson, B.S. ‘78
Here is what I shared with Philly.com and alumni networking sites.
"In his final remarks as chairman, Masser reflected on a tenure that began in January 2013. He said the arguments surrounding the scandal and its aftermath are signs of progress."
Keith Masser IS the scandal, or at least a central part of it. His conduct as a Board member helped create it in November 2011, when he and his colleagues admitted effectively on Penn State’s behalf that Penn State had somehow condoned or facilitated Jerry Sandusky’s actions. His subsequent dishonesty and dereliction of his fiduciary duty (as shown below) as a Board member and then Chairman aggravated it enormously. State Senator Yudichak described his conduct as "egregious," and Judge Pellegrini of the Commonwealth Court opined in effect that the Board, as led by Karen Peetz and then Keith Masser, was derelict in its fiduciary duty to challenge the NCAA sanctions. http://www.pacourts.us/assets/opinions/Commonwealth/out/1MD13_4-9-14.pdf?cb=1 (April 9 2014) Page 37. Note that the dissenting judge is bewildered, like the majority, how the Board could have approved the consent decree.
"The majority appears to arrive at this outcome because it is bewildered, as I am, by how the Board of Trustees of PSU could have approved or allowed to be executed a “Consent Decree” involving the expenditure of $60 million of PSU funds when the Consent Decree specifically states that the matter “ordinarily would not be actionable by the NCAA.” If, as the majority suggests, the NCAA did not have jurisdiction over conduct because it did not involve the regulation of athletics, then the expenditure of those funds is problematic, given that PSU is a non-profit corporation as well as being tax-exempt as a charitable organization, and that Boards of Directors of non-profit charitable corporations have a fiduciary duty to ensure that funds are only used for matters related to its charitable purpose – in this case, the students of PSU. See 15 Pa. C.S. §5712. Moreover, the majority position is understandable given the lax supervision by those responsible for insuring that non-profit and charitable organizations operate as non-profit and charitable organizations as well as their failure to take action against Boards of Directors and Officers who use funds of a non-profit and/or charitable entity to pay funds that they are not legally obligated to pay and/or expend funds not related to their charitable purpose or who no longer act as a charity. See Zampogna v. Law Enforcement Health Benefits, Inc., 81 A.3d 1043, 1047 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2013)."
Masser also lied to and on behalf of Penn State about the circumstances of Coach Paterno's dismissal, as did Ira Lubert and Mark Dambly.
Here is what Mr. Masser, Mr. Lubert, Mr. Dambly, and their colleagues such as Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier and BNY Mellon President Karen Peetz told the public, and the organization to which they owed a fiduciary duty, in March 2012. "Unanimous" makes every single Board member at that time equally responsible as a party to this statement, as in the “tolerate those who do” portion of the U.S. Military Academy’s Honor Code.
"While Coach Paterno did his legal duty by reporting that information the next day, Sunday, March 3, to his immediate superior, the then Penn State Athletic Director Tim Curley, the Board reasonably inferred that he did not call police. We determined that his decision to do his minimum legal duty and not to do more to follow up constituted a failure of leadership by Coach Paterno. …At about 9 pm, we unanimously made the difficult decision that Coach Paterno’s failure of leadership required his removal as football coach."
Now, here is what Mr. Masser had to say when he was under oath in the Corman versus NCAA lawsuit. “The decision to remove Coach Paterno had nothing to do with what he had known, what he hadn’t done. It was based upon the distraction of having him on the sidelines would have caused the university and the current football team harm. It had nothing to do with what Coach Paterno had done, or hadn’t done.”
If Paterno was fired for public relations reasons, and not for anything he had or had not done, he was not fired for failure of leadership. This makes every single Board member as of March 2012 a liar; the kind of person with character, ethics, and integrity defects whom the U.S. Military Academy washes out very quickly because a liar cannot command, and does not deserve, the trust, respect, or confidence of subordinates, peers, superiors, and other organizational stakeholders. This includes, by the way, former Penn State President Rodney Erickson and ex-Governor Tom Corbett as ex officio members.
How somebody like Ira Lubert is going to credibly represent Penn State to its students, alumni, faculty, employees, and the State Legislature is beyond me.
William A. Levinson, B.S. ‘78
