Regents to review UNLV monitoring of boosters

Friday, Dec. 15, 2000 | 11 a.m.

University regents plan to examine UNLV's troubles with the NCAA at their next meeting in Las Vegas on Jan. 19, the Sun has learned.

Thalia Dondero, chairwoman of the 11-member Board of Regents, said today she will place an item on the agenda seeking a discussion of what kinds of policies the university has initiated to monitor relationships between its boosters and basketball players.

"I want to see how we can stay out of trouble with the NCAA in the future," Dondero said.

The NCAA's infractions report released this week said UNLV had "no effective monitoring of athletic representatives" during the time it investigated allegations of recruiting violations and other unethical conduct at the university in 1997.

Those violations led to the NCAA placing UNLV on four years' probation and banning the university from post-season play this year. And that resulted in the firing this week of basketball coach Bill Bayno.

UNLV's own records, the NCAA infractions report said, showed the university had no policies and procedures in place to control the activities of its booster organizations during the two-year NCAA probe.

UNLV Athletic Director Charlie Cavagnaro disputed the NCAA's booster claims this morning.

"There were policies and procedures in place," Cavagnaro said. "They just weren't followed."

Cavagnaro said he looked forward to the scrutiny from the regents.

"It's important to the university to review what we do," he said. "That will be one more opportunity to inform our boosters of the rules and regulations, and we should take advantage of that."

Dondero, meanwhile, said she doesn't want to see the regents second-guessing the decision by Cavagnaro and UNLV President Carol Harter to dismiss Bayno after five years on the job.

She said she will oppose any efforts to call a closed-door personnel session with Harter to review her actions.

"The president has made her decision," Dondero said. "That's it. I don't want to be micro-managing."

Regent Mark Alden, a vocal critic of Harter's decision to fire Bayno, said he supports Dondero's position.

"Thalia's in charge, and I'll go along with anything she wants," Alden said today.

Alden said he plans to push for a bill at the Legislature next year that would make it a felony for any boosters to provide illegal benefits to college athletes.

He said that Texas has such a law in place.

"We absolutely need a statutory law to stop these renegade boosters, or this is going to continue, especially in a town like this where money is king," Alden said.

Dondero said she has asked Tom Ray, the university's legal counsel, to research whether the university system has any kind of policies in place at its institutions to keep tabs on boosters.

She said she felt badly for the current UNLV players.

"They're punishing the wrong group of people," she said. "The kids who are now playing have nothing to do with this issue.

"They're being punished by something that somebody else did two years ago and that bothers me. My concern is for the students."