Media Mogul Norm Pattiz Resigns From University Board

Norm Pattiz

Radio, Podcast mogul Norm Pattiz, who was recorded last year asking an actress at his podcast company if he could hold her breasts and had recently been pressured to leave the board of the University of California, will step down in February, The SF Chronicle has learned.

The board took no action against Pattiz when the recording surfaced in October 2016 because he wasn’t conducting UC business at the time, said the regents, whose job includes holding UC faculty and executives accountable for sexual misconduct. The regents have since changed their policy so that alleged outside misconduct can trigger an investigation.

This fall, attention returned to the Pattiz case as the #MeToo movement emerged and led to vast numbers of women speaking out about sexual harassment. Student protesters demanded his resignation, UC employees threatened a constitutional amendment to make it possible to fire a regent, and three fellow regents raised the matter again with board Chair George Kieffer.

In his resignation letter to Kieffer, Pattiz did not mention the sexual harassment accusation but said it was time to retire after 16 years on the board