IOWA CITY (AP) — Missing iPads. Unnecessary travel. Improper credit card purchases.
A recent audit of the University of Iowa athletics department found that administrators failed to adequately monitor information technology purchases, allowing wasteful spending and creating major risks for equipment theft. The department’s IT director, Patrick Delin, left his job in February as auditors were nearing the conclusion of an inquiry that was sharply critical of his practices, Iowa confirmed this week.
The audit comes at a difficult time for athletic director Gary Barta. Last week, a jury awarded $1.4 million in damages for discrimination, unequal pay and retaliation cited by his former top aide, Jane Meyer. At trial, the university argued that deputy athletic director Gene Taylor was paid $70,000 more than Meyer because his job included overseeing IT.
The 10-page report was unknown to Meyer's lawyers, who successfully argued she was doing similar or more work than Taylor for less pay.
Taylor left last month to become athletic director at Kansas State. He didn’t immediately respond to an inquiry.
In a statement Thursday evening, Barta said the school assisted with the audit after discovering “specific department guidelines may have been compromised” and has adopted its recommendations. He said Iowa is awaiting the results of a related investigation by the state auditor’s office.
The Associated Press obtained the report from the Board of Regents, which was recently warned that the findings revealed unacceptable weaknesses. The report found an array of questionable practices in IT, where purchasing expenses skyrocketed by 43 percent in one year.
The waste ranged from five football players who weren’t charged for school-issued iPads that were missing when they left to an employee caught making personal purchases on a department credit card. That employee refunded the money during the audit; the university hasn’t identified the individual or released details of the spending.
The report said one employee took two trips for “training” that didn’t appear to be related to job duties while another needlessly extended a trip by three days at a $530 cost. It said supervisory reviews of travel were ineffective, allowing unnecessary and excessive spending.
Delin, 39, had worked since 2012 as IT director, earning $100,000 annually. The university said he left Feb. 2 but declined to elaborate, calling it a confidential personnel matter.