Regents demand receipts with details

Friday, Dec. 1, 2006 | 7:19 a.m.

Dissatisfied with lax expense reporting procedures exposed by an audit of the UNLV Research Foundation, the Board of Regents moved Thursday to tighten guidelines for all private foundations throughout the state's university system.

In a meeting where tempers flared, the board's Audit Committee took steps to develop more stringent reporting standards in the wake of a regents' audit that found serious flaws in how Tom Williams, the Research Foundation's former executive director, documented nearly $84,000 in travel and meal expenses over a four-year period.

The Research Foundation, a private fundraising arm of UNLV, received more than $50 million in Energy Department grants during Williams' tenure. The foundation's Institute for Security Studies, criticized for failing to live up to its mission of turning UNLV into a leading academic authority on homeland security, received $8.9 million, mostly in federal money, during that time.

Williams, who was reassigned at UNLV in September amid the well-publicized troubles at the security institute, was gaveled and shouted down during Thursday's meeting by an angry Regent Steve Sisolak, chairman of the audit panel, after the former director tried to defend his loose expense reporting.

Sisolak said he was concerned that the vast majority of meal receipts that Williams provided UNLV officials did not contain details about what food and beverages were consumed - making it impossible to determine whether Williams was reimbursed for ordering alcohol, which is prohibited by both state and federal guidelines.

Then, with UNLV President David Ashley watching from his seat a few rows behind him, Williams began to spar verbally with Sisolak, telling the regent that he does not drink liquor and was well aware that the guidelines do not allow for the reimbursement of alcoholic drinks.

Sisolak slammed his gavel on the table and reminded Williams that whether or not he drinks alcohol was irrelevant.

The reporting procedures, Sisolak said, need to be strengthened so that the public knows exactly how its money is being spent.

"I want receipts that show the details," Sisolak yelled.

Regent Howard Rosenberg added: "It's a matter of being above suspicion."

The regents approved the audit critical of Williams and instructed their chief legal counsel, Bart Patterson, to research a new expense reporting policy for private foundations.

Williams contended that because the UNLV Research Foundation received most of its money from federal funding, he was able to follow the less stringent federal guidelines in documenting his expenses.

But the regents sided with the 11-page audit's conclusion that the Research Foundation needed to follow the university system's tougher guidelines.

The audit followed a UNLV audit two months ago that faulted the security institute for a lack of focus and management oversight.

Both audits stemmed from a June 18 Sun story that reported that the counterterrorism institute had fallen short of several of its key goals, especially those on the academic side.

Williams, now UNLV's associate vice president for federal agency initiatives, no longer has anything to do with the daily operations of the institute or the Research Foundation.

Ashley has moved the institute out of the foundation and brought it directly under the control of UNLV. He also has hired a new director, Scott Smith, a retired Army major general, to run the institute.