In the strongest sign yet that Rutgers is standing behind its decision to hire Julie Hermann as it new athletic director, John Farmer Jr., the university’s senior vice president and general counsel, penned a rambling guest column in Sunday’s Newark Star-Ledger that ended with this sentence:
“Hermann has earned this opportunity. She starts June 17. Period.”
Period, but not end of story.
Farmer compared Hermann’s struggle to remember events about her tenure as Tennessee’s women’s volleyball coach, when according to a Star-Ledger article she called her former players, “whores, alcoholics and learning disabled,’’ to former president Bill Clinton’s difficulty in remembering if he inhaled marijuana.
But Farmer’s column didn’t address several pressing questions: Why has Hermann, with the exception of a 10-minute conference call with reporters on Memorial Day, not made any appearances or responded to requests for interviews?
Why has she yet to answer the question of whether she was forthcoming in filling out vetting documents forwarded to Parker Executive Search, the firm Rutgers hired to delve into every candidates background?
And why didn’t Farmer address the concerns raised in emails by Rutgers search committee members that the process used in selecting Hermann was rushed and flawed?
The State University of New Jersey, already reeling from the tragic suicide of former student Tyler Clementi, who took his life after cyber-bullying outed him as gay, and the shocking behavior of former men’s basketball coach Mike Rice, who threw basketballs at players’ heads and hurled homophobic slurs, needed to be diligent in its hiring process and find the right candidate.
Hermann might be that person. But until Hermann and/or Farmer respond to concerns raised by legislators, members of the university’s search committee and alumni, there is no reason to give her or Rutgers, as Farmer wrote, the benefit of the doubt. Period.