Lantern file photo
Ohio State President E. Gordon Gee’s retirement July 1 may bring changes to the university administration, but Gee will still be calling Columbus home.
His contract with the university states should Gee choose to retire before the end of his term, which was due to last at least ten years beginning in 2007, he will be granted “the permanent status of President Emeritus, with an appropriate stipend, secretary and office for a period of five years.”
The details of Gee’s exit package have not been finalized yet, OSU spokeswoman Gayle Saunders said in a Tuesday email.
Gee’s supplemental executive retirement agreement indicates there has been about $2.33 million placed in his retirement account since June 2009, and that Gee’s account was due to receive a credit of $641,301 on June 30.
Gee’s contract says he has also been granted tenure at the OSU Moritz College of Law and the College of Education and Human Ecology.
Gee will be teaching at Moritz and writing books after a break of about a year, he said in remarks at his last summer tour’s final stop in Kent, Ohio, according to the Akron Beacon Journal.
Gee has been going on a tour of Ohio each summer since 2008 to fundraise for OSU. This year, though, the tour was abbreviated – 13 stops in two days. Gee has visited at least 44 counties each summer before, and last year, he spent two days in each region of the state during a tour that was spread throughout the summer.
Since the announcement of his retirement June 4, Gee has said a few times he is not leaving OSU altogether.
“I am leaving the presidency, I’m not leaving the university,” Gee said at a June 5 press conference. “I intend on being a very active participant. In fact, in many ways, I can be a much more engaged fundraiser on behalf of the university in my new role because of the fact that I’ll have more time.”
Gee holds a degree in history from University of Utah and a juris doctor and a doctor of education from Columbia University. Gee clerked under Chief Justice David T. Lewis of the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals and was later named a judicial fellow and staff assistant to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he worked for Chief Justice Warren Burger.
The announcement of Gee’s retirement came days after controversial remarks Gee made at a Dec. 5 OSU Athletic Conference became public. Comments about Notre Dame and the SEC in particular, among other remarks, brought national attention.
A March 11 letter from OSU Board of Trustees Chairman Robert Schottenstein to Gee on the subject of the offensive comments was obtained by The Lantern, where it was written that Gee’s remarks would not be tolerated. The letter outlined a remediation plan and said future mishaps will result in punitive action, including dismissal.
OSU Provost and Executive Vice President Joseph Alutto will be assuming the role of interim president effective July 1.
Gee earned slightly less than $1.9 million in the 2011-2012 fiscal year. Gee has been president at OSU since October 2007, but previously served as university president from 1990-1997.
