UO to build a Golf Course?

9/21/2012 update: President Gottfredson and Provost Mullens’s double secret faculty salary improvement plan will let faculty pick up summer pay caddying for the boosters and JH administrators. Tips go into a startup money pool for new science hires.

Personally, I don’t know what’s wrong with just using Hayward Field, it was good enough for Otter:

But enough joking, here’s the even more absurd truth. 9/19/2012: The UO Intercollegiate Athletics Committee met today for its annual retreat, agenda below. Part of the IAC’s charge from the Senate says:

As part of its function and in order to carry out its governance function, the IAC shall be consulted by:  

1. The athletics department on: …  

3. any decisions that potentially affect the campus environment, including construction, removal, or remodeling of facilities, changes in the timing of facilities use, or changes in permitted uses of facilities;  

We sat through a 5 hour meeting with AD Rob Mullens. Rob did not once mention a golf course. Neither did spokesperson Craig Pintens. And while they were busy keeping the IAC in the dark, Diane Dietz broke this story in the RG:

… A group of alumni led by Mick Humphreys, who was a UO golf standout in the early 1960s, earlier this month won the Lane County planning director’s approval for a proposed golf course on 796 acres of farmland and forests about two miles west of Creswell. Establishing the course would cost an estimated $25 million, including construction costs and the cost of creating an endowment to defray the cost of operations, said Mike Evans, a Springfield land use consultant. The money would be provided entirely by donors, he said. … The University of Oregon Athletic Department is in discussions with the prospective golf course donors, spokesman Craig Pintens said.

Tax deductible contributions, presumably.

IAC Retreat Agenda

1. 10am – Introductions 
1. introduction and overview of AD administration and structure
2. introduction and overview of IAC administration and structure
2. 10:15am – initial discussion points:
1. overview of charge
2. charges, responsibilities, membership, reporting
3. IAC structure and internal communicative protocol 
4. overview of our general mode of inquiry this year (where we are/where we are going)
5. ground rules
6. internal communication
7. confidentiality, public meetings law  (Jim O’Fallon)
8. notes, recording
3. 2012-13 agenda overview and topics of discussion topics
1. monthly meetings
2. 10th year review
3. Task Force Items overview and delegation
4. further topics: conversations with coaches, messaging efforts, fundraising, NCAA certification report
4. 11:15am – Charge: Represent the academic standards of the university as embodied in the University of Oregon Mission Statement in all decisions;
1. mission statement overview 
5. 12:00 – catered lunch
6. 12:30pm – Charge: Promote greater understanding, for the university community, of intercollegiate athletics and the relationship between academics and athletics.
1. 12:30pm – Dominican Republic Video and report (Katie Harbert)
2. 12:40pm – Life of a student athlete (James Harris)
3. 12:55pm – Tim Duy on the economic impact of Athletics on the wider community
4. NCAA Eligibility (Gary Gray)
5. Website updates (Dev Sinha)
7. 1:10pm – Charge: Advise the administration, the senate, and the athletics director on any athletics department policy or program, including the athletics department budget;
1. what is our communicative protocol with these three parties?  how can we be clear and effective?
2. overview of departmental policy and programs including Title IX concerns (Mullens)
3. NCAA Academic Rules, non-academic Rules and Legislation (O’Fallon)
4. overview of departmental budget, a discussion on the involvement of the IAC in capital projects and hiring, financial situation for this year and projections for the next 10 years (Eric Roedl)
8. 2pm – Charge: Promote and safeguard opportunities for student athletes to excel in academics and protect and ensure the academic integrity of student athletes; and
1. overview of the current body of student-athletes – distribution of majors, graduation rate etc: Steve Stolp
2. report on Student Experience Waddell/Harbaugh