Donovan’s new job adds to cost of UH concert fiasco

My first reaction was the same as many of yours: You’ve got to be kidding.

Then I realized we’re dealing with the state of Hawaii and specifically the University of Hawaii.

UH is where you can be judged unworthy of your job and a few days later you walk away with a big check.

Evan Dobelle, Herman Frazier, Greg McMackin, Virginia Hinshaw — they all got six or seven figures to please just go away. Those are just the ones of which I’m aware. It’s bad enough they were overpaid to begin with.

Well, at least Jim Donovan isn’t just leaving with parting gifts. The former athletic director will have a different job at UH starting today.

The school wouldn’t tell us the title of that position Sunday, but by the description it sounds like there might be lobbying involved. And that’s fitting, because some government bigshots stepped in to make sure Donovan wasn’t entirely dismissed in the wake of UH losing $200,000 in a botched attempt to book a Stevie Wonder concert.

In case anyone needed a reminder, it’s good to have friends in high places.

OH, BY THE WAY, we still haven’t been told what happened to the $200,000 in question, or given even a ballpark figure on the cost of the ongoing investigation that UH said found "no wrongdoing on the part of Athletics Director Jim Donovan."

Sunday’s release also quotes the new Manoa chancellor, Tom Apple, as saying, "Jim served the University well as our Athletics Director."

That can be debated, as Donovan has many supporters and many detractors. It’s the nature of the job. And it’s obvious that Donovan — a former UH football player and longtime employee — has put his heart and many, many hours into what he calls his "dream job."

But if UH truly feels good about the job Donovan has done as AD, why is it moving him to a different position? That makes no sense at all.

It also doesn’t ring true, because:

» Donovan’s role was significantly diminished in the school’s move out of the Western Athletic Conference, as that of UH vice president Rockne Freitas (now the acting athletic director) expanded.

» Donovan’s choices for the selection committee to pick a new football coach were rejected by upper campus, as was his first recommendation for the job itself.

» Only Donovan and another athletic department employee, arena manager Rich Sheriff, were put on paid leave in the wake of the Stevie Wonder concert fiasco (Sheriff also returns to work at UH today). Upper campus employees may also be part of the investigation, but there has been nothing official from UH indicating that.

SO NOW UH needs a new athletic director.

It used to be Freitas’ dream job, too (or something close to it, since he got paid to play in the NFL). He applied for it in the past.

He’s on the record saying he’s just on loan from upper campus, but that could change. It may have already.

As for this new job for Donovan, the pay is around double what the person who filled the slot before was getting. Donovan will make a little more than $200,000 per year (his base pay as AD was $240,000).

Untold thousands of dollars for the investigation and a month of paid leave for two employees. And the original $200,000, still missing.

But this latest cost is easily the craziest. Starting next year, around $100,000 in additional annual salary expense that didn’t exist before.

Regardless of where the accountability is ultimately found to lie in this fiasco, that’s what it boils down to at this point.

A huge waste of money. Our money.

It’s just sad that this whole thing started because of an idea that was supposed to raise funds for the school.

Maybe now there should be an investigation of how UH handles its investigations.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com, or at 529-4783 or on Twitter as @dave_reardon.