The California State University system needs new administrative leadership -- now.
Last week, when the university's top dogs -- CSU Chancellor Charles Reed, Chief Financial Officer Richard West and a handful of lesser luminaries -- testified before the Joint Legislative Audit Committee about the university's $662 million computer system, they put on the most embarrassing public display of arrogance and willful defiance since Enron officials appeared before Congress.

They so angered the hearing panel that one legislator called for the legally improbable "impeachment" of the chancellor, vowing to take the idea to the Assembly and Senate. As the hearing exceeded its scheduled time it was clear, except perhaps to the chancellor and his staff, that good relations with the Legislature are doomed as long as the incumbent administration holds power.

"This will impact their budget, absolutely," said committee chair Assemblywoman Rebecca Cohn, D-Saratoga, hardly good news in a university system already facing $260 million in budget cuts, and whose trustees are contemplating stiff increases in student fees.

Reed and Co.'s appearance was their second before the joint committee, which has been reviewing the findings from a yearlong state audit of a computer system purchase and implementation called the Common Management System.

A state audit says that CMS is $300 million over budget, that there are serious conflict-of-interest issues and that CSU charged ahead with the $662 million project without any business plan to justify forcing all 23 campuses to replace and augment their computer systems. The state auditor also says CSU entered into expensive consulting contracts without competitive bidding to implement the PeopleSoft company software for student records, human resources and accounting.

Equally egregious, the legislators said, is evidence of pilfering from student dormitory funds, parking monies and dollars paid for extension classes.

Now, as the software is rolled out, university staff is complaining it doesn't work as advertised and is incredibly cumbersome, plus the CMS -- ostensibly to allow universities to share data -- doesn't work.

While the rhetoric surrounding CMS is thick, the state report is clear and damning, testifying to a CSU administration that ignored all warning signs and that, instead of funding the project publicly, slid funds around to avoid scrutiny. Most troubling at the hearing were the repeated denials by the chancellor and his staff, who maintain -- despite the audit and testimony to the contrary -- the CMS is on time, on budget and working just fine, thank you.

The chancellor is entitled to his delusions. But the CSU's reliance on state funding requires that lawmakers have faith that, as they dispatch several billion dollars to the chancellor, every dollar is going to be spent well, and on students. That faith has been severely tested since the audit's release in March and in two contentious hearings.

Conventional political wisdom says legislators would never intentionally slash the CSU budget, even considering the scope of these blunders. To do so would punish students, faculty and staff who, in this case, are victims of poor management.

Perhaps.

But as the state struggles with an astounding budget deficit, we don't need a CSU administration that is out of touch with fiscal realities and that has lost the trust of the very people it relies on to keep the classroom doors open from San Diego to Humboldt.

CSU trustees should step up to the plate and make changes at the top of the CSU executive ladder -- starting with Reed. And they should do it soon, before all the CSU monies on CMS have been doled out to consultants.

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Michael J. Fitzgerald is a journalism professor at California State University, Sacramento, former chair of its Faculty Senate and a former member of the CSU Statewide Academic Senate.