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Vice President Peter N. Smits
today sent this letter to the Fresno State campus community, members of
campus boards and volunteers:
You may have been puzzled by the headline and first few paragraphs of
the Fresno Bee story on Saturday, Feb. 16, regarding matching gifts in
athletics at Fresno State.
We can’t explain why the headline and story reference a $2 million
“loss” and state that “academic programs at Fresno State were
shortchanged by $2 million.”
We appreciate the Bee’s coverage of activities here on campus. In this
case I was pleased to spend several sessions with the Bee reporter,
George Hostetter, regarding this subject. However, in the past day or so
we received several calls from people who were generally confused by the
article. We thought that some additional information might be helpful to
those of you who may be getting similar questions from others in the
community
As we have previously explained, academic programs were not directly
involved in this issue and therefore never were “shortchanged.” We have
previously publicly affirmed that decisions made in 1986 led to the
university receiving funds over the years that it was not qualified to
receive specifically for athletics. The problem was addressed in 2003
and the university’s policy and procedure was changed to assure that
corporate policies were carefully followed.
To ensure that we are making a proper response, we commissioned an
extensive external audit covering the period 1986-2003. We made that
report available to the public, and it’s still up on the Web (see
www.fresnostatenews.com/2007/Report.htm).
And following the audit the university has been contacting all 197
companies identified as providing matching gifts to athletics to
determine if the matches were qualified. We’re right on track in working
on those contacts and we’re finding that, overwhelmingly, companies are
qualifying the matches or do not want repayment of matches that did not
qualify for athletics. Where action was suggested we are following their
lead to the letter.
These gifts from local donors were made through the Bulldog Foundation
intended by the local donors and directed by them to be gifts to
athletics, not to academic uses on campus. Unfortunately, policies of
some corporations that donors asked to “match” the gifts prohibited
these gifts from being used for athletics or other purposes directly
benefiting the donor. The individuals’ donations could be used for
athletics, but the university could not receive the corporate matching
gifts specifically for athletics in those cases.
We hope these clarifications are helpful. If you have any further
questions about this issue, please call me and I’ll be happy to speak
with you.
Peter N. Smits
559.278.6050
psmits@csufresno.edu
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