UH must repair its reputation

In the aftermath of the Stevie Wonder debacle, University of Hawaii President M.R.C. Greenwood told Manoa faculty union leaders in October that her "much more fundamental concern" was the university’s freedom "to make our own personnel decisions independent of political pressure." Although a commission that accredits UH agrees, the university’s problem is that it has failed repeatedly in recent months to show that it deserves the relative autonomy it seeks.

In a scathing letter to Greenwood, the Western Association of Schools and Colleges expressed concern that "individuals within the government" — i.e. state legislators — seek to "undermine the authority" of the UH administration and its Board of Regents. The letter by Ralph A. Wolff, the association’s president, asserted that current bills, if passed, "could interfere with the university’s ability to manage its own affairs."

The Legislature is considering measures to transfer UH construction to the state procurement officer, give legislators the power to halt UH salaries at more than twice the governor’s, halt the use of tuition and special fees to pay UH executive and managerial salaries of more than $150,000 and change the constitutional method of choosing regents.

"We’re holding them accountable and we’re questioning them. We’re not telling them how to do it," said Senate President Donna Mercado Kim, who introduced a half-dozen measures dealing with UH after chairing a special investigating committee. "Autonomy does not come without checks and balances."

Wolff pointed out that the UH administration brought the legislation upon itself: "Overlapping, confusing or inappropriate lines of authority seem to have contributed to the handling both of the Stevie Wonder concert and the Manoa campus athletic director’s contract." Jim Donovan was placed on paid administrative leave from that post and reassigned to a new, lucrative position before leaving months later to become athletic director at California State University-Fullerton.

UH has invited such criticism. Wolff’s letter rightly criticized the Board of Regents’ handling of the Wonder concert for failing "to have addressed the deeper issues regarding the blurred and overlapping lines of authority within the board itself, or between the board, the system and campus administration." Any gains, of which there have been a few, he suggested, "appear to have been undermined, and seriously eroded, by the revelations, hearings and reports around an unfortunate set of events."

Further, in a recent hearing on UH construction procurement rules, explosive charges were made against a UH associate vice president for alleged mismanagement and making costly job-specification changes in favor of cronies. But Greenwood and the regents — instead of forcefully stepping up to reassure, seek the truth and generally deplore any corruption at taxpayers’ expense — closed ranks and clammed up. The state attorney general’s office is now investigating those allegations.

Two years ago, the association accredited UH-Manoa through 2021. However, a serious catch on confidence now exists: The group has plans in the next four months to discuss with legislators, the Governor’s Office and UH regents, its concerns about the regents’ effectiveness, "confusing" lines of authority at UH and policy gaps; and to conduct a special visit here in spring 2014. A senior UH official told the Star-Advertiser’s Mary Vorsino that those actions are unprecedented.

The association’s scolding must not cause the UH administration or regents to place the public in further darkness. Too often, regents have met behind closed doors, reluctantly apologizing that UH administrators had "mishandled" the Wonder blunder. An external investigation by a law firm was full of redacted names. For the sake of the university’s credibility, the upper-level dysfunction must cease if autonomy is to be deserved. These are administrators and regents of a public institution, not private fiefdoms, who need to steer more openly and call for accountability to instill confidence within the community.