The University of Washington continued to search for a director of Housing and Food Services yesterday, interviewing preliminary candidates. HFS has had an interim director for nearly eight months now, since former Director Paul Brown was reassigned after allegations of inappropriate behavior in February.

Emily Carleton, a communications specialist in Housing and Food Services, accused Brown of sexual harassment, and has filed a lawsuit against the university for $500,000.

According to The Seattle Times, Brown had a romantic interest in Carleton and would send inappropriate e-mails and make sexual advances. At one point, Carleton was asked to dinner at a restaurant on Lake Union where Brown allegedly offered Carleton the opportunity to manage the $250 million West Campus development, which will provide new dorms and apartments for thousands of students. Carleton said she was in no way qualified to handle such a massive project.

Eric Godfrey, vice provost for Student Life at the UW and Brown’s supervisor, said he became aware of the accusations in February of this year, and the accusations immediately prompted an investigation by University Complaint Investigation and Resolution Office (UCERO).

“UCERO is an office within the University that investigates allegations of this type on most occasions,” said Norm Arkans, associate vice president of media relations and communications at the UW.

Godfrey said the initial investigation reports showed that Brown had, in fact, acted inappropriately.

“I received an informal reading on their findings, and there were some undisputed facts,” Godfrey said. “Those facts prompted me to conclude that some of Mr. Brown’s behavior was inappropriate and unexcusable. I had to weigh his serious lapse of judgment against 23 years of service to the university.”

Godfrey made the decision to remove Brown from his position within HFS.

The possibility then emerged of moving Brown to a different role within the UW’s Capital Projects Office.

Brown was moved and now serves as director of the Student Housing Project Group within the Capital Projects Office. It is a staff job serving as a support role with no managerial oversight.

Brown’s salary of roughly $140,000 has remained the same.

“In making my decision that [Brown] should no longer be director of HFS, my view was that he shouldn’t be in a supervisory role,” Godfrey said. “The effort was to move quickly and in the best interests of the department, university and complainant.”

Despite Brown’s inappropriate actions, Godfrey maintains that he still serves a valuable role for the university.

“We now have someone with deep expertise concerning the residence halls embedded in the Capitol Projects Office, when normally staff in that office would not have any expertise on the operations side,” Godfrey said. “He’s in a support role and will be responsible for the execution side of the project.”

According to The Times, UCERO never completed their investigation of the allegations.

The investigation was closed after Carleton filed a tort claim on Sept. 9 of this year.

There is a mediation hearing between Carleton and the university scheduled to take place later this month. Godfrey declined to comment on any further punitive action that may be taken with Brown.

Reach reporter Casey Smith at news@dailyuw.com.