A top University System of Maryland official said he plans to take action against Bowie State University's fund-raising organization for spending at least $100,000 in scholarship and campus activity money on expenses that include a boat cruise, furniture and questionable consulting contracts.

Lance Billingsley, chairman of the university system board of regents, said the board would consider sanctions against the Bowie State University Foundation and those who "were involved in the dealings" when it meets Aug. 28.

In addition, the university system is preparing to release results of its investigation into finances at the Bowie foundation. University officials and a state lawmaker have raised new questions about some of the foundation's consulting contracts, which include a $12,000 deal with a former state delegate who is the son of the foundation's treasurer.

"There have been some financial dealings that are not in keeping with the purpose of the foundation," Billingsley said.

"We're going to have to take some action."

One possibility, Billingsley said, would be to close all the individual foundations operating at each state university and to fold them into one foundation serving the whole system.

"This problem with affiliated foundations has been troubling me since I became chairman," said Billingsley, who has run the board of regents since 1995.

But he also said he would move against individuals who were involved in any misspending of foundation money.

In the midst of the financial mess, foundation officials have been pointing fingers at Bowie State University President Nathanael Pollard Jr. and his staff.

Pollard, in turn, blames his former chief fund-raiser -- one of three university employees he has removed from foundation posts since January.

'He runs it'

Ira Moss, chairman of the foundation's board and a Prince George's County chemical company owner, said Pollard is responsible for the foundation.

"I don't run it. He runs it. He runs it on a day-to-day basis. It's his employees who handle the books," Moss said.

"I don't even know what goes on over there at the university most of the time. I'm just a volunteer."

Pollard refused repeated requests for an interview this week. When he was approached by a reporter at his office he declined to respond to questions.

On Tuesday, Pollard said through his spokesman, John H. Britton, that he would respond to written questions by the close of business yesterday.

However, he failed to do so.

In May, the university system's internal auditor launched a probe of the nonprofit foundation after The Sun reported that thousands of dollars had been misspent and the university administrator chosen to rectify problems, Russell A. Davis, had a history of writing bad checks and had wrongly taken $3,873 from another campus-connected nonprofit group.

Draft report delivered

System auditors delivered a draft of their report to the regents' audit committee about three weeks ago.

Committee members expect to finish reviewing it by early next week, said Michael C. Gelman, the committee's chairman.

Gelman and Billingsley declined to discuss details of the report before completion of the committee review.

But interviews with university officials and documents obtained by The Sun show how the foundation spent some of the money it raised to use exclusively for scholarships and campus activities.

Boat trip on Potomac

Among the expenditures:

About $3,356 went for an Odyssey Cruises boat trip on the Potomac River in 1997, a university official said. Foundation officials say the trip was meant to entertain potential donors, though few donors actually attended, according to a university official who reviewed the report. Foundation rules prohibit the use of scholarship money for such expenditures.

The foundation in July 1997 signed a five-year contract worth $12,650 for four season tickets to see the Washington Redskins at the new Jack Kent Cooke Stadium. Foundation board members used last season's tickets, but neither the foundation nor the board members paid the bill, according to university officials.

John Lippincott, spokesman for the university system, said the Redskins have forgiven the debt for the remaining four seasons of the contract, but the team is demanding payment for last season's tickets. The foundation has agreed to make the payment when it is able, he said.

Last October, the foundation bought $41,000 in furniture for the offices of the university's top fund-raiser and his staff, according university officials.

The foundation also spent at least $24,000 on questionable consulting contracts, including a deal with former state Del. Michael Arrington, a lobbyist and son of the foundation's treasurer, Henry T. "Hank" Arrington, who signs the organization's checks.

The younger Arrington was hired to "perform consulting services for the 1997 legislative session for a fee of $12,000," according to university records.

Michael Arrington said university President Pollard hired him to advise the administration on political issues and to set up meetings between the president and key lawmakers responsible for appropriating money to the university.

Among those Arrington said he tried to arrange meetings with were Del. Howard P. Rawlings, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and Sen. Barbara A. Hoffman, chairwoman of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee.

'No impropriety'

"There is no impropriety on my part, nor was there any scheme for me to try to get any money from Bowie illegally," said Arrington, a Prince George's County delegate from 1991 to 1995.

Henry Arrington, who coordinates anti-drug and community outreach efforts for the Prince George's County State's Attorney's Office, said the arrangement was not nepotism because Pollard, not he, set up the deal with his son.

The legislators, Rawlings and Hoffman, said the arrangement sounded peculiar.

Case of poor judgment

Neither recalled anyone from Bowie State setting up meetings with them during the 1997 General Assembly sessions.

"That all sounds a little questionable to me," Hoffman said. "It may be totally on the up and up, but it shows poor judgment."

Moreover, Kathleen Skullney, executive director of the political watchdog organization Common Cause Maryland, said it appears to her that the Bowie State foundation paid Michael Arrington to lobby the General Assembly, which the organization should have reported to the Internal Revenue Service.

The foundation did not report the contract to the IRS. Michael Arrington said he did not "lobby" lawmakers on any legislation, but set up meetings and advised the president.

But Skullney says those activities resemble the work of a lobbyist.

"If it walks like a duck, sounds like a duck, chances are it is a duck," Skullney said.

"When you're into hair-splitting, you know it's an attempt to skirt the law."

Getting a piece of the pie

The minutes of a Sept. 27, 1997, foundation board meeting suggest that the organization was looking to use Michael Arrington and Prince George's County state Sen. Gloria G. Lawlah to win money for the school.

"During the next session of the General Assembly, Bowie should address the state's surplus in 1997 and find out how the University can get a portion. It was noted that Senator Gloria Lawlah is BSU's Congressional Liaison and Mr. Michael Arrington is the Community Liason," minutes from the meeting stated.

The foundation also discussed asking members of the General Assembly to help raise money from companies that do business with the state.

Donations from vendors

"The [foundation] board should solicit those companies on the state's list of approved vendors, using their contacts at the Maryland General Assembly as leverage to get donations," the minutes also read.

Lawlah sits on the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, which approves the university's budget.

Bowie State also pays her $30,400 a year to promote its interests in the U.S. Congress, according to state records.

Lawlah said, however, that she does not speak on Bowie's behalf in the Maryland legislature or to companies that have contracts with the state.

"That would be inappropriate," said Lawlah, who was paid by the university and not the foundation.

Another foundation consulting contract that officials questioned went to Rhonda Wiles-Roberson, a lawyer who is a close personal friend of the university's former top fund-raiser, Alvin Major II, according to university records and Major. That contract paid $12,234 from July 1 to Nov. 30, 1997.

Pollard criticized Major

In a confidential memorandum in December, Pollard criticized Major for the contract as well as for payments to other consultants and furniture purchases the president thought were unnecessary.

"The spending of BSU Foundation funds in ways that have not been approved is a practice of your management that is unacceptable," Pollard wrote in a memorandum to Major that was among the documents he gave to The Sun in response to a Freedom of Information Act request.

But Major, who left the university April 6 after more than two months on paid sick leave, said that Pollard gave the orders for many of the expenditures, just as he did for the contract with Michael Arrington.

"Pollard wanted to control the foundation," Major said.

"I think that for him, he has to have a sense that he is on top of everything, knows everything and controls everything."

Pub Date: 8/06/98