'It is clear to me that my presence on the board has become a distraction,' Steve Garban said in a statement.
Steve Garban announced tonight he is resigning from the Penn State University board of trustees. Garban was chairman of the board when the Jerry Sandusky sex abuse scandal came to light.Steve Garban, a longtime member of the Penn State board of trustees and chairman when the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse scandal came to light, resigned from the board tonight, according to the Associated Press.
Garban is the first board member to resign in the wake of the Sandusky scandal. Three previous board members left this spring when their terms expired and one was voted out by alumni.
"It is clear to me that my presence on the board has become a distraction and an impediment to your efforts to move forward," Garban said in a statement, according to the Patriot News.The Patriot News reports current Chairwoman Karen Peetz, in accepting Garban's letter, praised the "selfless leadership" the decision to step down now represents and said it "exemplifies the culture shift we are working hard to create."
ESPN is reporting two trustees told the station this week that the board was most angry at Garban, who the Freeh report said was informed by then-university president Graham Spanier in April 2011 of the Sandusky investigation but failed to notify his fellow trustees.
A 1959 graduate of Penn State, Garban was captain of the football team and would go on to serve for 12 years as the university's senior vice president/treasurer. He has been a member of the trustees since 1998.