Donor’s Influence

In an ongoing discussion spanning generations, the ability of donors to influence the nonprofits they support, is examined in this article from the New York Times resulting from one major college donor wanting his money back after the school did not consult him on a recent personnel decision.

An excerpt.

“In the past week, Robert G. Burton has been portrayed as the flawed face of highly commercialized intercollegiate athletics.

“In a scathing letter to Jeff Hathaway, the University of Connecticut athletic director, Burton demanded the return of $3 million because he felt he had not been sufficiently consulted in the hiring of Paul Pasqualoni as the Huskies’ football coach. He demanded that his family’s name be removed from the team’s training complex.

“Now Burton, the chief executive of Burton Capital Management based in Greenwich, Conn., has been cast as a spoiled booster who feels that a $7 million contribution to the football program over the years gives him the right to be included in decision-making. Criticize him all you like, but Burton is the face of UConn’s new reality. The university embraced big-time football; now it must deal with the attendant big-time headaches.

“Philip E. Austin, UConn’s interim president, and Lawrence D. McHugh, the board chairman, have privately tried to mend fences with Burton, their largest sports donor.

“If the incoming president, Susan Herbst, who takes over in July, is wise, she will phone Burton now, assuring him that no disrespect was intended. If Burton insists that Hathaway be fired, Herbst should gently tell him that $7 million is not nearly enough to influence personnel decisions.

“The question raised by Burton is whether large donors have the right to call the shots.

“In almost any area of life, yes, but not in the university,” said James W. Earl, a professor of medieval literature at the University of Oregon. “A general rule is that your money does not win you influence. When word gets out that the donor is pulling this string, it’s a scandal.”

“Earl has been a voice of resistance at Oregon for years, protesting in particular that the presence of Phil Knight and Nike, the company Knight helped found, has injured the university even while elevating the football team into national title contention. During a telephone interview Thursday, Earl said he had raised the white flag.

“I’ve given up the fight,” he said. “We’re so deep in this that we can never go back. A professor can only do so much, and money talks. Phil Knight is a major donor. You really don’t want to get in his way or cross him. It does not take much to get him to walk away.”