Not FCS, But, What's All The.....
Posted: Mon Dec 29, 2008 9:14 pm
......controversy swirling around Rutgers? AD fired, some fundraising irregularities, to much money to Schiano, issue with stadium upgrades?
Robert E. Mulcahy, the athletic director at Rutgers University for the past decade, was fired Wednesday amid revelations of unchecked spending and secret deals.
The firing comes three weeks after a special review committee issued a sharp rebuke to Rutgers for allowing the athletics department to operate without oversight -- answerable to no one -- in the drive to bring big-time college football to the state university.
The university's review of Mulcahy's department followed a series of stories in The Star-Ledger that detailed hundreds of thousands of dollars in off-the-books spending that never appeared in the Rutgers budget, secret contract enhancements given to head football coach Greg Schiano and a no-bid contract with a sports marketing firm hired after it put Mulcahy's son on its payroll.
The group's report found no wrongdoing, but it is not the last examination of the school's athletics program. The state comptroller has sought hundreds of documents from the university.
Problems began in 2007 when Mulcahy decided to eliminate six varsity teams in the name of cost savings -- including men's swimming and diving, men's tennis, and lightweight and heavyweight crew.
Records show much of the money was shifted to football.
Over the past year, a series of revelations raised questions about spending under Mulcahy and secret deals that allowed the athletics department to do business off the books.
One of the most controversial was a report that showed Mulcahy had made side deals through a vendor that boosted Schiano's salary by $250,000 and paid for other department spending, including charter flights for the coach. Under Mulcahy, Rutgers also undertook a $102 million expansion of its stadium, but the project is now stalled for lack of funding.
http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2008/1 ... _robe.html
