1. It is too early to form a wholly educated opinion, as nothing reported in the Washington Post suggests that the analysis of Ladner's spending is complete.
2. However, given what is available, I conclude the following:
3. Much of this "crisis" is overblown -- many of the allegedly questionable expenditures by Ladner and his wife as reported in the Post seem to me to be absolutely reasonable expenditures by a university executive responsible for raising the funding and prestige profiles of a private university.
For instance, the Post picks at the scab of the "waterfall in the backyard" -- which by the way, has long been a sore spot with anti-Ladnerites. One infamous anti-Ladnerite, the kid who started benladner.com, used to sneak into the backyard to hang out by the waterfall and take pictures, expressing righteous indignation when staff kicked him out, saying the since he paid tuition, it was "his waterfall, too".
Anyway, it should be noted that Ladner had the waterfall installed as part of a broader effort to shore up the steep hill at the edge of the backyard, which was crumbling and eroding away. To my mind, a university president who is tasked with entertaining wealthy Washingtonians and US and international muckety-mucks with the hope of extracting large checks from them should be allowed to fix up the backyard of his house, and to even make it nice by installing a fake waterfall. I should also say that I know he used that backyard for such entertaining because I personally attended several events there.
His trips to Nigeria, his driver, the expensive food -- all of that can reasonably be construed as expenses normally incurred by a chief executive in the performance of his functions. If I'm going to ask the CEO to travel to Nigeria to establish another branch of the university or otherwise forward university goals, he can damn well fly first class.
Even such expenditures as his wife's birthday party could be reasonably construed as the funding of an opportunity to entertain wealthy guests whose pockets he wanted to pick for the university's benefit. Indeed, even the Post admits that he seems to have been successful doing that.
4. Having said that, Ladner appears to have occasionally either a) taken advantage of lax University oversight of Presidential expenditures or b) been careless about his spending. Having spent some time around Ladner and his wife as Speaker of AU's General Assembly, and as president of the University Honors Program Student Advisory Board, it was clear from the first time I met them that both had a taste for "the finer things in life." I can see how their taste for high living might have contributed to lax spending discipline on their part, and even eventually a casual disregard for the line between personal (i.e. son's party) and job-related expenses.
5. Regarding a remedy to the situation -- I believe that while serious, Ladner's offenses are correctible, and that his performance in raising AU's reputation and funding levels merit retaining him as chief executive of the university. Moreover, the problem generally (lax spending controls by executives) can be protected against without significant effort or cost. As Mr. Close noted, Mr. Ladner's expenses can be audited on a more frequent basis, and the Board of Trustees can take a more active role in policing the compliance of AU's executives with university policies. I say admonish Ladner publicly, force him to repay the university for any clearly personal expenses, implement stronger and more frequent financial controls, and engage the Board to exercise its responsibilities better.
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