Use a cutesy cartoon figure to remind them of your bloated, scandal ridden big-time athletic program:
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8/9/2017: Three years ago yesterday the UO Board of Trustees paid President Mike Gottfredson $940K to leave town immediately. Half up front, the rest within two weeks. In exchange, Gottfredson released UO from all liability related to his brief and disastrous employment as UO President and agreed to pay his own attorney costs, etc:
I’m no Harvard law professor, but I think it’s the $940K that makes that a legally enforceable contract, not just a promise:
But will UO enforce it?
As reported in this Jack Moran story in the RegisterGuard last month, after winning dismissal of the federal court case by the three former Dana Altman basketball players and alleged rapists who had argued that UO and Gottfredson had illegally ruined their basketball careers by kicking them off the team and campus without due process, the UO General Counsel’s office announced that they would sue the players for legal costs:
The University of Oregon is seeking reimbursement of nearly $53,000 in attorney fees and court costs from three former Ducks basketball players who sued the UO after being kicked out of school following a rape investigation in 2014.
The university on Friday filed a motion for fees and costs in U.S. District Court. The move comes nearly two months after a federal judge dismissed civil lawsuits brought by the players, who were banned from campus for up to 10 years but did not face criminal charges after a female student accused them of sexual assault.
In the request for reimbursement, lawyers for the UO characterize the lawsuits — filed by Brandon Austin, Dominic Artis and Damyean Dotson — as frivolous and unreasonable.
“The university rarely seeks prevailing party fees,” the motion states. “But in this case, plaintiffs pursued claims that lacked any reasonable basis in law or fact, which forced the university to waste considerable public resources.” …
Seems iffy, unless of course you’re one of the Miller Nash Graham & Dunn attorneys that UO is paying by the hour at $350 per. In contrast the contract with Gottfredson is pretty clear cut. So why won’t the UO General Counsel’s office unleash Miller Nash et al to take Mike Gottfredson to court over his share of the Austin et al legal fees?
I don’t know, but there are many more details in the court docket here, including plenty of expensive conversations with “Dr. Gottfredson” in the detailed billing records:
8/8/2016: UO to mark 2nd Gottfredson Day with traditional appearance in Federal Court
[Remember the Hat Day is November 21].
Ryan Thorburn has the data on pathetic Duck ticket sales in the RG here; According to data provided by the athletic department, the average renewal price of a season ticket is down by 3.9 percent, with 65 percent of seats decreasing in price and the other 35 percent remaining flat at…
Nick Budnick reports in the Portland Tribune. Sort of reminds me of former UO VPSA Robin Holmes’s attempt to manipulate UO student voters, here.
Around the O has info here. Yes the VPAA reports to the EVPAA, and yes we know that’s a violation of the normal rule that the longer your title the less important your job.
Seems like an excellent choice. Around the O has the details.
8/3/2017 update: That’s not a rumor, it’s a fact. Meanwhile, reports from staff survivors are that the inside temperature hit 92 an hour ago. Here’s the report from last year: 8/19/2016: Faculty Union to sue university over cruel and inhumane lack of AC in PLC The NYT has the story here. Just kidding about…
8/3/2017 update: No charges filed against former Dana Altman player Dylan Darling has the latest in the RG here: Police at a small college in Wyoming have closed a sexual assault case involving a member of the University of Oregon’s Final Four basketball team and no charges will be filed.…
We can only hope so. Under the porky contract that AD Rob Mullens negotiated, and Chuck Lillis and the UO Board of Trustees Executive Committee approved in Feb 2015, UO is still on the hook for $10M or so in salary payments to Helfrich, even though Mullens fired him last…
I wonder how long before one of Rob Mullens’ unpaid student-athletes stands up to the system. Probably a while. They are pretty scared, and with good reason. The Washington Post explains: … The NCAA released a statement of its own, saying the kickoff specialist could have kept making the YouTube…
Seems he’s pretty well qualified: Around the O has more here: Wineland in the news A Nobel for Teasing Out the Secret Life of Atoms (The New York Times) Quantum Computing Wins a Nobel (The New Yorker) Scientists are close to building a quantum computer that can beat a conventional one(Science Magazine)…
Gosh, I wonder whose idea this was. Faculty with 9 month contracts start on Sept 15. Classes start Sept 25th. And the UO Board of Trustees meets Sept 7-8. But at least the Board’s December meeting will be at a time when our Trustees can expect to have a chance…
The variance on the prediction that the rate of return on investments over the next 20 years will be 7.2% and not 7.5% is so large that those PERS consultants willing to say 7.2% with a straight face must be very well paid indeed. As Professor Fearless explains in today’s…
InsideHigherEd here. Also see Ted Bergstrom’s page here. Why is the prestigious AAU apparently doing nothing to help its librarians combine to fight the predatory monopolistic science publishers? The non-profit JSTOR once seemed like it had some promise, but now it seems to function as a part of the big…
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-uc-irvine-rescissions-20170728-story.html