Institutions address donor misdeeds
By Steve Giegerich
Associated press
SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. — It used to be called the Brennan Recreation Center. These days, it's more like the recreation center formerly known as Brennan.
Associated Press
Seventeen months after Robert Brennan was sent to a federal prison for bankruptcy fraud and money laundering convictions, the Seton Hall Board of Regents quietly removed his name this month from the building where university students have exercised since its dedication in 1987.
On Dec. 13, 17 months after Robert Brennan was sent to prison for bankruptcy fraud and money laundering, the Seton Hall Board of Regents removed his name from the building where students have exercised since its dedication in 1987.
Seton Hall is not alone in the predicament of accepting a gift that wound up tainted by the benefactor's misdeeds. The University of Missouri-Columbia has a professorship named for Kenneth Lay, late of Enron, and at the University of Michigan, the medical center and architecture college carry the name of graduate Alfred Taubman, the fallen former chairman of Sotheby's auction house.
"It puts the institution in a very awkward position," said William Hamm, president of the Foundation for Independent Higher Education, which links business leaders with private colleges and universities.
Unlike Seton Hall, however, colleges and universities more often opt to leave donors' names where they are and keep their monetary gifts.
Such decisions can disturb fellow alumni. Michigan law school graduate David Boyle, for one, wishes his alma mater would nix the name of Taubman, who was convicted last year of violating antitrust laws.
"The university should feel obliged to hold as morally praiseworthy a public image as possible," Boyle said. "If we keep the Taubman name, what's next? A Michigan student union building courtesy of WorldCom?"
Michigan isn't considering any removal, a university spokeswoman said.
Missouri has kept an endowed chair in international economics named for Lay, the now-disgraced former Enron chief who donated $1.1 million in company stock to his alma mater in 1999. The school fortuitously cashed in its stock a year before Enron's collapse, at $82 per share.
Most schools are blind-sided when beneficence goes awry, but North Dakota knew what it was getting into when it accepted $100 million from a former student hockey player, said William Hamm, the president of the Foundation for Independent Higher Education.
The gift, from hotel and casino mogul Ralph Engelstad, requires the university to retain its nickname, the Fighting Sioux.
Thumbing his nose at American Indian organizations long opposed to the nickname, Engelstad had more than 4,000 reproductions of the mascot installed in the arena that opened last year bearing his name.
"At the very least, he had incredibly bad taste and remarkable insensitivity," said Scott Lowe, a professor of philosophy and religion who has joined other protesters in boycotting arena events.
Engelstad died last month, but the Grand Forks school has no plans to remove his name or the mascot likenesses.
Seton Hall, on the other hand, may go further to distance itself from dicey donors. Regents for the Roman Catholic school in northern New Jersey have approved a policy reserving the right to erase other names from campus buildings — and they may be asked to do that.
"It is scandalous to hold up and, in effect, honor someone who has betrayed all the ideals of the institution in terms of moral and ethical principles," said Seton Hall communications professor Robert Allen. He wanted to get rid of Brennan's name years ago, but was turned down then.
The university also has structures named for Dennis Kozlowski and Frank Walsh Jr., both former executives of beleaguered Tyco, the multinational conglomerate that has come under investigation for financial improprieties. On Tuesday, Walsh was fined $2.5 million after pleading guilty to committing securities fraud.
"The bottom line is that these aren't frequent issues," said Hamm, of the education foundation. "Most donors are noble people — that's why people become donors."
When the benefactor who gave $500,000 to Augsburg College in 1987 turned out to be less-than-honorable, the Minneapolis school turned the tables on him.
Augsburg accepted the donation, but then declined to name a wing of a building for alumnus Elroy Stock after learning he had written letters promoting racial purity to thousands of mixed-race couples.
Stock sued to get his money back, and the case dragged on for nearly decade before a judge ruled Augsburg could keep the donation.
The school uses the money to fund scholarships for minority students.
