An Open Letter to Victor Vieth, Executive Director of National Child Protection Training Center, on His ‘Independent Review’ of USA Swimming’s Safe Sport Program
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August 21, 2013
This week’s announcement that USA Swimming has commissioned an “independent review” of its safe sport program is just the latest in a series of chess moves by this U.S. Olympic Committee national governing body in the run-up to a meeting next week with the staff of Congressman George Miller, the California Democrat and ranking minority member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce who is investigating how the organization responds to sexual abuse allegations.
Paul Newberry of the Associated Press wrote an excellent article blunting this particular round of organized swimming’s $200,000 public relations offensive on the issue of widespread sexual abuse by youth coaches over the last generation. The new PR campaign was the subject of an internal memo, first reported by my website Concussion Inc. and later analyzed in my piece for MomsTeam.
Wisely, the wire service did not stop with the rosy self-appraisal of the hire of Victor Vieth of the National Child Protection Training Center to evaluate the steps that were put in place only after ABC’s 20/20 investigation three years ago exposed the magnitude of the sex abuse issue. Reporter Newberry also quoted B. Robert Allard, a leading attorney for victims in this sport, characterizing the review as “‘lipstick applied to a pig’ as the organization prepares to meet with congressional investigators.”
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