UNITED STATES
Sports Illustrated
November 7, 2018
By Lauren Green
The calls to decertify USA Gymnastics began in earnest as the Larry Nassar case unfolded and only got louder as victims came forward, new information about those involved came to light, and the organization continued to stumble.
With Monday’s call from the USOC starting the decertification process, questions are arising about what this new national governing body for gymnastics should look like. What kind of leadership should this new organization have? Should this person come from a gymnastics background or be completely outside of the community? What are the programs or policies that need to be in place?
Both survivors and former athletes were adamant that the person or a member of the group in charge needs to be someone who knows gymnastics and understands the sport and its history. They pointed to the fact that both Steve Penny and Kerry Perry came from marketing backgrounds—and look how that turned out.
“It’s going to be important that it’s someone who understands the world of elite gymnastics,” Rachael Denhollander said in a telephone interview. “They can identify abusive coaching structures, they can know how cleverly [the structures] can be masked, they can know what’s normal and what’s not normal.”
The bigger question might come with what type of leadership should be put into place. In the past, there was a CEO/president and a board of directors. But perhaps now, a better solution might be to appoint more than one person, to limit the amount of power given to one individual.
“I think a committee would be best because when you have more than one person, I think you have some checks and balances,” Sister survivor Emily Meinke said. “If you appoint one person then, as we’ve seen, they have free reign to do whatever they want. Even if there is someone bringing something to their attention, they have the authority to just shut it down.”
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.