From the LA Times:
A series of intense discussions ensued, but badminton officials were too busy preparing for Tokyo to reach a decision. When they returned, chief executive Linda French — who referred all questions for this story to attorney Little — called on a relatively new board member, Nancy Hogshead-Makar, for advice.
Hogshead-Makar is a four-time Olympic medalist in swimming who has devoted herself to women’s rights in sport. As an attorney, she founded the Champion Women organization to advocate for Title IX compliance. As a survivor of sexual abuse, she teamed with other swimmers to get a well-known coach, Mitch Ivey, banned for life.
The conversation with French left her with mixed emotions.
“I just think people, in good faith, didn’t understand the rules,” she said. “They honestly thought that because it was so long ago, the victim didn’t want to come forward … that they were not responsible for reporting to SafeSport or the police.”
But as a woman who had pushed for the new protection laws, Hogshead-Makar worried because the accused coach was still prominent in American badminton, still working with minors. She told French to report immediately.
“That is why I’m on the board,” she said. “I knew what the law was.”
I am still waiting for current and former board members of the Boy Scouts USA and a number of other institutions to publicly apologize for their nonprofit's "sanctioned" misdeeds. As we know in the case of the Scouts, leader sex abuse of scouts was known and carried on for a long time with the only action by Scout leadership being to file the complaints. It is uncertain how much of this filing was made known to board members, in the early years, but it is for certain that the more recent (10 years?) board members could not have been unaware of the situation.
We know that at the USA Olympic organization, Larry Nassar, as the team physician raised the bar for sexually abuse to a new level and for a consolation prize to citizens now sits in prison. His survivors will be no less satisfied nor completely resolved emotionally for what was done to them but at least some resolve has occurred ALTHOUGH not really by the Olympic Committee Board. Now yet another Olympic related organization is rife with fault having, at the badmitton organization a similar circumstance, not on such a grand scale as with Nassar but scale is not the issue. Meanwhile, the whistleblower who identified the incidence has been fired and the process for survivors achieving justice is just beginning.
Given my proclivity in understanding the role of board members in addressing what has happened under their watch I am always looking for board member response and action when reviewing these stories. While it's too early to say what indeed may come of this situation, I did take note that one board member is actually quoted about the incidences identifying that she advised taking action. Yay for this part.
Now of course we must wonder what other board members should be doing and also those previous members. We know for certain that there are at least clear steps that should be taken but are we clear when and what level board members should be made aware and understand what action should be taken by them? And, is ignorance really bliss by board members? I pose "NOT".