Two years since Pres Karl Scholz started and he still seems to have no effective internal controls on administrative spending. Apparently only the little people have to book their travel through Concur.
Read all the amazing details at https://dailyemerald.com/166936/features/abroad-sojc-dean-flies-high-back-home-his-school-spirals-into-deficit/
A very thorough investigative report from Tristin Hoffman:
Juan-Carlos Molleda, dean of the School of Journalism and Communication, is facing scrutiny by University of Oregon officials over his extensive university-funded international travel. Meanwhile, his school’s budget has spiraled into a deficit under his management, a six-month investigation and review of hundreds of financial and travel documents by The Daily Emerald has found.
UO Provost Chris Long told The Emerald on June 5 that Molleda is being internally audited for his travel spending. The audit was launched after The Emerald reported on Molleda’s Feb. 21 email about his travel. His email to SOJC faculty was sent on his own command after The Emerald filed public records requests for his travel records.
Molleda, 60, has served as dean since 2016. He has many official reasons to travel as the leader of the SOJC, from attending professional conferences to raising funds from donors. He receives an annual travel budget of $30,000 from his job, and university travel rules often have allowed him to draw on endowment funds from the UO Foundation, which are separate from his school’s budget, to pay his additional travel costs.
The cost of Molleda’s travel and first-class flights dwarf those of two other UO deans. In the 2023-2024 school year, Molleda’s travel expenses rose to $46,000, according to travel documents obtained by The Emerald under Oregon’s Public Records Law.
Over the same period, then-Dean of Students Marcus Langford spent just over $11,000 on travel. Then-law school Dean Marcilynn Burke spent $3,700.
In the past two years, Molleda has traveled to Paris, Lisbon, Madrid, Medellín, Querétaro and other international cities. He often flies first-class and adds personal days to many of his trips without disclosing them to UO, nearly 700 pages of his travel records obtained by The Emerald show. …