Penn State Trustee Sues Board Of Trustees

A Penn State alumni-elected trustee has sued the university’s Board of Trustees for allegedly withholding information about Penn State’s $4.6 billion endowment and how the endowment is used.

Barry Fenchak said he is suing the university in order to gain access to documents he repeatedly requested from the Board of Trustees and the university, though he was denied each time. The lawsuit was filed days before the board’s two-day meeting in Altoona, during which the board is set to discuss budget and tuition rates.

Fenchak is suing the board over Pennsylvania Nonprofit Corporation Law that says all Penn State trustees have the right to inspect and copy information about the university’s finances, a right he says was repeatedly denied.

Fenchack was elected to Penn State’s board in 2022 and said that since then, he has made his concerns known about Penn State’s use of its endowment. Most notably, Fenchak said he noticed Penn State’s administrative fees tripled after 2016 from 0.75% of the endowment.

In his lawsuit, Fenchak said he was repeatedly turned down by Penn State administrators as he looked for financial records. According to the lawsuit, Fenchak was told his requests were inappropriate and that he would never see the financial records. On his website, Fenchak wrote that he spent 20 months searching for the university’s financial records.

“Well. I had no choice but to take legal action, so here we are,” Fenchak wrote.

“To be clear, I am making no allegations of malfeasance or gross negligence,” he continued. “But activities like those would be impossible to uncover without access to the information requested. And for the record, I hold several financial industry licenses and certifications so I do know what I’m looking for.”

Fenchak is representing himself in Centre County court.