Courier-Journal: Felner helped bail out Rhode Island center
Former University of Louisville dean Robert Felner directed almost $130,000 in U of L funds toward a University of Rhode Island education center he created, and which was in dire need of money, according to e-mails and documents obtained by The Courier-Journal.
And in at least once instance he told officials at the National Center on Public Education and Social Policy in Rhode Island to submit a bill to U of L for research work, but use the money for center salaries and future work, those e-mails show.
Such an action may violate university policies and could result in consequences as serious as dismissal, U of L officials said.
The Rhode Island center is one of two agencies Felner had a personal connection with that received money from a $694,000 federal education grant he managed while at U of L. The other center was based in Illinois.
Felner, who was dean of U of L’s College of Education and Human Development until resigning in June, now is the focus of a federal investigation into possible misuse of the grant money.
Between 2005 and this June, Anne Seitsinger, director of the Rhode Island, and Felner exchanged hundreds of e-mails, including several where she worried about running out of money to pay staff salaries, according to U of L documents The Courier-Journal received through an open-records request.
In one 2005 e-mail, Seitsinger told Felner: “Our budget is pretty desperate. We are short about $90K.”
That same month, the center’s business manager, Diana Laferriere, e-mailed Felner, writing: “Robert, are you giving out loans? We sure need one right now!”
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