Former USU president likely broke Utah law with spending and contract awards, state audit says

Shortly after being named president of Utah State University, Elizabeth “Betsy” Cantwell said she wanted some “basic upgrades” done on her office. The original plan was to spend $10,000 for new carpet and a fresh coat of paint.

Some leaders at the northern Utah school said they voiced concern with the project, coming at the same time as state lawmakers were planning multimillion-dollar budget cuts for public higher education. But, they told state auditors, while Cantwell acknowledged the optics, she forged ahead anyway — and widely expanded the renovations without seeking prior approval.

By the time the work was done, the total cost neared $300,000 for what had become a complete and lavish office remodel. That notably included more than $184,000 in furniture and a top-of-the-line $750 bidet for her personal restroom, as previously reported by The Salt Lake Tribune.

Now, months after Cantwell stepped down to take a new gig out of state, a new audit released Friday reveals for the first time that the Logan school is still looking for a way to come up with the money for her splashy renovation.

“The university has yet to fund the project and still owes the full amount,” the audit notes.

That’s just one example offered in what is a blistering 104-page report conducted at the direction of state lawmakers, who have expressed frustration after Cantwell’s expenditures were first brought to light by The Tribune’s reporting.

The state had been withholding instructional funding from USU, anticipating the audit’s revelations. But seeing that money returned might now be harder after auditors concluded Cantwell’s spending and contract decisions likely broke state law.

The Utah attorney general’s office didn’t immediately answer whether it may seek charges against her. A request for comment to Cantwell through her new school, Washington State University, was not returned.

The audit findings largely mirror the same figures The Tribune reported. It appears some came directly from that reporting, as well as coverage from Cache Valley Daily, with auditors citing numbers published “before this audit by other parties.”

But the audit also unsparingly criticizes the university, as well as some of its past and current administrators, its board of trustees and the overarching Utah System of Higher Education. All contributed to a system with little oversight, which presented Cantwell and others in USU’s highest leadership positions an opportunity to easily exploit it, the audit states. No administrators have been held accountable.

The report specifically details that Cantwell allegedly tried to influence what companies the school contracted with to favor friends, which is a clear violation of procurement law.

“Based on the documentation we were able to review, there has been a pattern of severe noncompliance within the university for many years,” the report states.

The report notably never identifies Cantwell by name, but the details, including the timeline provided, make it clear who the subject is. It mostly attributes the issues to “poor decision-making” that came from “the president’s office.”

“USU’s poor leadership, financial stewardship and accountability led to many of these problems,” the report notes.

The auditors delineate that the Utah Board of Higher Education has since hired a “new president for USU who has a record of good leadership.” That is Brad Mortensen, who previously led Weber State University in Ogden. He took the helm of Utah State in early November and has promised to redirect the school after years of scrutiny.

“We’re ready to move out of the shadows from some of this controversy,” he said after the audit was released.

Lawmakers piled praise on Mortensen during a Friday hearing about the report while heaping reproach on Cantwell.

“I’ve been very critical over Utah State University for a couple years now,” said Utah House Speaker Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, who serves on the state’s audit committee.

Many of USU’s trustees also attended the hearing. The board has since passed new rules requiring that presidential spending be subject to four reviews a year to check for “prudence and integrity.” Most large expenses also now require approval.

Auditors say they’re “encouraged” by those changes. But they say it’s not enough.

“We found cracks in the governance system at Utah State,” said Jesse Martinson, audit manager.

They recommended 26 improvements the school can make to ensure taxpayer funds are not abused by those entrusted to steward the university.

Auditors say USU president likely violated the law

Cantwell took the helm of USU in August 2023. In her brief 18 months as leader, she spent at least $660,000 in university funds on personal projects and benefits, according to The Tribune’s findings, which are buttressed by the audit.

The audit notes Cantwell and other administrators often spent extravagantly — on nice hotel rooms, national conferences, fancy in-state retreats and top-of-the-line office equipment.

It concludes that USU had few policies governing executive spending. Receipts for reimbursements were typically approved without question. There were no caps on travel, few limits for presidential office or residence renovations and only one parameter for buying new cars.

That was limited to a president purchasing three new vehicles, which Cantwell did, including a climate-controlled golf cart. Those amounted to $146,334 total.

Geoff Landward, the state commissioner of public higher education, acknowledged that even when there were policies at USU, often, “they just weren’t following them.”

Flags from the school’s purchasing office and internal audit office were frequently “bypassed,” the audit notes. Those might have “addressed many of the above issues” if they had been followed.

“University leaders are not held accountable for violating university policy, which undermines the effectiveness of existing internal controls,” the report states.

Though there weren’t many USU spending policies during Cantwell’s tenure, there are a handful of state laws that govern large purchases by publicly-funded institutions — and Cantwell appears to have ignored them.

For any purchases over $5,000, for instance, Utah law requires a competitive bidding process. If a sole procurement is done, there is supposed to be documentation showing why. There are also policies to avoid awarding contracts based on favoritism.

But for years, that process was openly defied by departments on campus, auditors said, primarily the president’s office. The report alleges that several times, Cantwell tried to influence what companies the school contracted with.

In one of those instances, the audit alleges, Cantwell unilaterally decided to spend $200,000 with an external consulting group that she had “prior professional ties” with. That was despite USU’s purchasing office warning her office that the company had not been financially vetted, the auditors note.

On another occasion, the audit alleges, Cantwell attempted to change the outcome of a competitive bid process after her preferred vendor wasn’t selected. The report says she tried to alter that vendor’s application and get them to offer a lower price. That is a clear violation of state law.

And Cantwell hired an individual with “prior professional connections to the university,” auditors said. That individual provided an initial estimate of $30,000 in work but ended up receiving more than $100,000 as the project grew. No documentation was provided to validate their selection as the sole vendor.

The audit doesn’t name the companies alleged in those incidents.

But it recommends that the school establish a formal accountability system for university purchases, with a specific line of sight on the president’s office — in addition to the caps trustees have instituted.

They also say presidential spending should be included in annual performance evaluations. All reported violations should be promptly reviewed, and random checks should be performed for compliance.

‘Noncompliance’ went beyond the president

It wasn’t just Cantwell or the president’s office that were violating the law, auditors found, writing: “When leadership fails to follow policy, it sets a precedent that encourages further noncompliance.”

Auditors identified spending issues throughout every level of the school, across departments and all employee classifications.

“The nature and number of financial issues identified during this audit were concerning,” the report says. “We noted several instances where presidents, vice presidents and employees were not committed to following policy.”

One department spent $1 million without getting any kind of approval, the auditors reported. Another continued to contract with the same vendor for more than a decade — ultimately spending $12 million — without ever seeking competitive bids, despite multiple warnings.

In that case, USU’s legal department raised concerns but approved the contract anyway, citing “desired administration relationships,” the audit says. The purchasing office also asked why the department didn’t follow policy and got no response.

Additionally, some university personnel stayed in high-priced hotel suites, while colleagues on the same trips found accommodations for much less.

“This discrepancy shows some attitudinal differences toward spending in the absence of policy,” the audit states. “USU did not have strong policy in this area until the board of trustees provided policy guidance in November 2025.”

The hotel room rate for any university-related travel is now set at $540 per night; anything above that will require approval. (Cantwell regularly stayed in rooms that went above that amount, expense records indicated.)

The school also wasn’t providing any employee trainings on its existing policies. And the auditors said that needs to change immediately.

“We asked the purchasing office to provide records of training that were provided to university personnel; however, we received no documentation,” the audit states.

At one time, the school was operating under a point system that penalized employees for violating financial policy — similar to a system at Southern Utah University that auditors held up as a good example.

But USU staff told auditors that was discontinued because corrective actions weren’t actually being enforced.

The issues, auditors found, also extend to all of USU’s statewide campuses, not just Logan.

A Price campus employee failed to show up to work for two years — but was still being paid, according to an internal USU audit from 2024 that auditors cited. Administrators were aware and allowed it to continue, the USU audit found, because they were friends with the staffer.

In their new report, state auditors noted that situation is still a concern: “Based on our conversations with university personnel, we are not convinced that these issues have been fully corrected.”

Poor communication across campuses and an unwillingness to hold employees accountable has resulted in “asset misappropriation, misconduct and favoritism,” the audit states, as well as low morale.

USU trustees provided ‘defective’ governance

The bruising audit squarely places blame for the past president’s excessive spending — as well as that of other employees — on “weak oversight” at an institution that has “struggled with governance, leadership and culture.”

It says that “at first glance,” USU appears “structured for success.” But with a deeper look, the institution’s history shows chasms at every level. The audit lists:

• The president has “not provided strong oversight or controls” or been subject to such.

• USU’s leadership has “minimized the impact” of the school’s internal audit office and bypassed existing policies.

• The board of trustees has “not fully acted upon” its authority in setting limits on the president or providing any substantial checks on spending.

• And the Utah System of Higher Education and its board has also not supported USU’s board of trustees in providing clear direction on how it should hold a president accountable.

The auditors conclude all of that amounted to “defective and insufficient governance.”

USU’s board of trustees is supposed to financially oversee the university. But the Utah Board of Higher Education hasn’t provided specific instruction.

Commissioner Landward acknowledged the gaps and said the state board has been working on changes that match the audit’s recommendations.

Currently, trustees are selected by the governor and typically have financial connections to the school they serve, such as donors. Often, they are overly taxed with the tasks they have, the audit says, and they aren’t given much outside support for making objective decisions.

Landward said that model isn’t working. “We have to decide what trustees should be,” he said. “I think they need to be an oversight body.”

He wants his office to provide independent staff to support the board of trustees at USU and other schools. They are closest to the presidents, he said, and they have the most direct line for providing oversight. But they have to be empowered.

His office is also limited. The work of the 10-member Utah Board of Higher Education is done by state-appointed people who volunteer their time, and the governor downsized the board in 2023.

That’s why the board must rely on trustees, because it alone can’t manage the finances of each traditional college and university president in the state, as well as the eight technical college presidents.

Utah Board of Higher Education policy says that every year, the executive members of a school’s board of trustees should review their president for “key performance indicators.” Then, every four years, the full board of trustees should look at the president in an in-depth evaluation.

The report notes that timeline is at odds with Utah’s high presidential turnover rate. Cantwell never hit that four-year mark, leaving her post last March. The auditors suggest more frequent evaluations.

When auditors surveyed trustees across the state, only 26% correctly answered that it’s their job to conduct those evaluations. More than a third thought it was the job of the Utah Board of Higher Education. That raised alarms.

“While USU was the focus of this audit, we found evidence that this may be a statewide issue,” the audit notes.

What’s next

USU President Mortensen and Tessa White, the chair of USU’s board of trustees, provided a letter in response to the audit.

In it, they vowed to follow the recommendations. They also noted when exactly they expect each new compliance system to be in place and highlighted actions already in the works.

“The university will continue to use this audit as a roadmap for sustained and continued improvement,” their letter states. “Our focus is not only on correcting past deficiencies, but on building solid systems of governance, oversight and leadership accountability that protect public resources, support our statewide mission and restore confidence in institutional decision-making.”

After the hearing Friday, Mortensen said the items Cantwell purchased have been inventoried and acknowledged the school could consider selling them off to make up the funds.

But he also noted: “Removing a bidet will cost money.” Additionally, the school used the golf cart to drive students to finals in December, which officials documented in a video shared on social media.

Senate President Stuart Adams joked about that during the Friday meeting; Mortensen said a lot of the students he approached about a ride had “stranger danger.”

In the meantime, he added, “I’ve been trying to be careful about additional expenses in the president’s office.”

Mortensen added the university will examine past procurements and make adjustments if needed.

He hopes that their dedication will help the school win back the money that the Legislature is holding onto — $8.8 million in “reinvestment” funds that are supposed to go to student programs.

Beyond USU, the auditors made several large-scale recommendations that they believe could change accountability for public university presidents statewide.

They suggested the Utah System of Higher Education should provide executive coaching for all presidents and base a president’s pay on how well they do in evaluations. Both of those are already in the works, said Commissioner Landward.

Additionally, with Utah’s high turnover rate, auditors recommended creating a process to find, support and develop talent within the state to fill presidential positions and save money searching for candidates who may not turn out to be strong leaders.

“Hiring the wrong leader has shown to be very detrimental to an institution,” the report states, and “the financial cost of a presidential search is also great.”

The Utah System of Higher Education has spent $665,000 on job searches for new presidents since 2023. USU specifically spent its own $400,000 on top of that for searches to replace its last two leaders.

Landward said the state higher education board has also started working on “succession plans” to find candidates within the state’s college system.

He said the hope is to “invest in good leaders up front” so the state isn’t footing the bill later — in more ways than one.