By Phil Roszak
Maryland state Sen. Jim Brochin thinks enough is enough.
In a statement published on Towson University’s website, Brochin said Comptroller Peter Franchot was out of line when he called on Towson University President Maravene Loeschke to resign earlier this month.
“I thought it was really disingenuous and hypocritical for the comptroller to chastise Maravene,” Brochin said in an interview. He added that the state did nothing after the University of Maryland cut many sports, broke open-meeting rules and then switched to the Big Ten Conference.
“I think he is a very good comptroller,” Brochin said of Franchot. “He is a good check on the governor’s spending.” But Franchot has the wrong take on this issue, Brochin said.
Brochin is one of several public officials to come to the defense of Loeschke in response to Franchot calling for her to resign because of the way she handled the elimination of baseball and men’s soccer.
The chancellor of the University System of Maryland, William Kirwan, and groups from Towson were also quoted in the statement supporting Loeschke.“I don’t think you take one issue and hang a broad picture like that on it,” Brochin said in an interview.
He added that the single issue is one of “sports, not even academics.”
Franchot said during an April 17 Board of Public Works meeting that “the president of Towson, in my view, has forfeited her claim on moral leadership.”
He continued, “It is with a heavy heart, I believe, in the best interest of Towson University that she should resign.”
The audio of that meeting can be found here.
Brochin, reiterating the point he made in the statement on Towson’s website, said the issue is more than baseball and soccer at Towson. The University System of Maryland needs to look at Title IX and the decisions universities say they are making based on the law, he said.
“We need to find out the answers before we jump ahead with this stuff,” Brochin said. He questioned if cutting teams for compliance is necessary at this point.
Title IX is enforced by the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.
“In general, the office discourages the elimination of teams because it diminishes opportunities for students interested in participating in athletics, and so is contrary to the spirit of Title IX,” Jim Bradshaw, spokesman for the Education Department, said in an emailed interview.
“OCR’s policy is to seek remedies that do not involve the elimination of teams,” he wrote.
Franchot said in the April 17 meeting that cutting men’s teams to make representation of both sexes substantially proportionate was not the preferred method of compliance with Title IX.
“OCR has one open Title IX complaint involving Towson University, which appears to allege discrimination against females regarding accommodation of athletic interests and abilities,” Bradshaw wrote.
Office for Civil Rights received the complaint on March 26, he wrote. That is more than two weeks after the decision to cut baseball and men’s soccer was announced on March 8. Bradshaw did not say there were any complaints received by Office for Civil Rights before the sports were cut.
“That complaint is under evaluation to determine if the allegations are appropriate for OCR investigation,” Bradshaw wrote.
In an email interview Bradshaw wrote, “this complaint does not involve allegations related to the cutting of men’s sports; OCR does not have a Towson Title IX complaint related to that issue. And, OCR cannot provide an opinion about specific Title IX issues related to a particular institution.”
“Based on the comptrollers comments there are questions that still remain that the comptroller wants answered in a public forum,” said Andrew Friedson, spokesman for Franchot.
“If the question is has the comptrollers views changed,’ the answer is no,” he said.
Brochin said many people have asked if he thinks Franchot’s involvement in Towson athletics is motivated by a bid for governor of Maryland.
“That’s not his motivation. I don’t know what is, but it’s not that,” Brochin said.
Towson News 