Fresno State issued a statement about corporate matching donations last week, clarifying information from an article in The Fresno Bee.

In 1986, a malfunction in policy sent Fresno State along a 17-year journey of incorrect gift distribution. Smits said the process was flawed, but was fixed in 2003 when an external audit was conducted.

The audit went through every matching donation that Fresno State received.

Peter Smits, Vice President for University Advancement at Fresno State said he received several confused phone calls from people in the community.

Smits has been dealing with the repercussions from the lapse in policy for over a year.

Matching gifts is a donation policy that many companies have with their employees.

Employees that make a donation to Fresno State have their gifts matched by their employer to Fresno State, if the company has the policy. Smits said that the original 1986 policy stated if an employee gave $1,000 to athletics, then their employer would also give $1,000, if it was company policy.

“The issue that arose is that there were companies that did not match gifts to athletics; their policy did not allow it,â€Â Smits said. “We were not qualified to receive the money, but we took it anyway.â€Â

Gifts to academics were not diverted to athletics.

“The originating gift from the donor was a gift to athletics. When they wrote their check to athletics, they did not write it to academics. Academics never had the money to divert.â€Â

In many cases, the matching donations from the companies should never have been accepted. Smits said the employee of the company should never have signed the form to donate. Also, Fresno State should not have signed the form certifying that the donor gave a gift.

When Fresno State certified the donation form, Fresno State was also confirming that the gift complied with the donor company̢۪s policy.

“The main point is that the originating gift from the donor was to athletics,â€Â Smits said. “Matches that came in went to athletics, qualified or not. Maybe we shouldn’t have gotten it, but it didn’t go to academics.â€Â

Smits said that Fresno State realized that local people might be confused, which was the reason for the statement.

Fresno State discovered in 2003 that the matching process was in error and in 2003, fixed the problem. The external audit for all 17 years can be found on fresnostatenews.com.

Smits said that Fresno State is not taking matching gifts to athletics because most companies do not match for athletics.

There are 8,000 companies that match gifts in the Central Valley. Additionally, it costs Fresno State more money to certify gifts to athletics than it receives.

“If it costs me $1.50 to raise a dollar, why would I do it?â€Â Smits said. “There were at least four to five people involved in the athletics certification process. I think we’re being good stewards of our state money to not be inefficient.â€Â

Fresno State is currently moving money that was unqualified from athletics to qualified programs. Scholarships, the library and the marching band have all received money. Smits said that those programs were chosen because every company matches for those programs.

“No company has called about the athletic matching gifts,â€Â Smits said. “This issue has not affected donations. In July of 2005 we started a fundraising campaign on campus. Up to Dec. 31 of this year, we have raised $72.5 million.â€Â

Fresno State is currently in the process of calling 197 companies that were involved in the unqualified matches and asking the companies what to do with their donations. That process will not be completed until the end of the fiscal quarter.

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“Then we can finally put all of this behind us,â€Â Smits said. “I’ll be glad to give all the information out in June.â€Â