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Ohio State's board of trustees is ready to break its silence about the university's ongoing football scandal, a trustee said in brief comments Tuesday while promising a fuller statement next week.
Members of the 18-member board of trustees, a group including some of the state's most powerful individuals and charged with overseeing Ohio State, has consistently refused to comment on the NCAA investigation that led to coach Jim Tressel's forced resignation on May 30.
Speaking after a committee meeting, trustee Robert Schottenstein said the board should have something more concrete to say at next week's meeting of the full board in Columbus. Schottenstein said the board would comment if it could, but noted the process is still in the early stages.
''We're at the beginning of the beginning of what we're doing,'' said Schotteinstein, chairman of the board's audit committee and chief executive officer and president of M/I Homes. ''If we could we would. It's not my style to be not forthcoming.''
He said he could not provide a preview of what the board - either himself, board chairman Les Wexner or Ohio State President Gordon Gee - might say when the board meets on campus June 23-24.
''We're in this for the long haul and we'll get it worked out,'' Schotteinstein said. ''I promise.''
Other trustees at Tuesday's audit committee meeting declined to say anything, including Jack Fisher, executive vice president of the Ohio Farm Bureau, and Algenon Marbley, a federal judge in Columbus.
''I understand,'' Marbley said, when it was pointed out that people were interested in hearing the board's perspective.
Wexner, the billionaire chairman and founder of Limited Brands and a major donor to the university, has repeatedly declined to comment.
Tuesday's audit committee session was held at Ohio State's Longaberger Alumni House, in a room across the hall from portraits of Woody Hayes, the legendary Ohio State football coach fired in 1978 after he punched a Clemson player during the Gator Bowl.
Tressel's hugely successful, 10-year Ohio State coaching career ended in disgrace when he stepped down after failing to tell alert his superiors that players were getting improper benefits under NCAA rules.
The coach knew players received cash and tattoos for autographs, championship rings and equipment and did not tell anyone at Ohio State or the NCAA for more than nine months. NCAA rules - and Tressel's contract - specify that he must disclose any and all information about possible violations.
In addition to the Tressel situation, the NCAA also is looking into player car deals and other possible violations.
