The San Diego Union-Tribune (California)
John Reed, who heads the Burnham Institute of Medical Research in La Jolla, said he would recuse himself from all activities of the state stem cell institute pending an investigation into a conflict-of-interest complaint against him.
The state Fair Political Practices Commission said Monday that it would investigate an incident involving Reed and Robert Klein, chairman of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, as a result of complaints filed by a taxpayer advocacy group and a request by state Controller John Chiang.
Reed sent a six-page letter to the stem cell institute’s staff after it decided that Burnham did not qualify for a grant because the principal investigator applying for the funding is not a full-time staffer at the La Jolla institute.
Klein had recommended that Reed send the letter.
The stem cell institute’s staff flagged Reed’s letter as being a conflict of interest because board members are not supposed to do anything that would influence the awarding of money to the institute where they work.
Reed said that at the time he thought it was OK to send the letter because a scientific review committee already had scored the Burnham’s grant application, giving it the second-highest score of all applications in that round.
The board also had voted to fund the grant, and Reed did not participate in that vote.
John Simpson of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights filed a complaint about the incident to the FPPC and asked for Reed’s resignation. A week later, Chiang said he thought the commission should look into the matter.
Reed said yesterday that he welcomed the commission to resolve the issue.
