DARTMOUTH — Clyde Barrow, whose studies of gambling habits showed hundreds of millions of dollars leaving the Bay State each year for Connecticut and Rhode Island casinos, has resigned from his job at the state university where he conducted the research.
Barrow, who resigned as executive director the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Center for Policy Analysis, has made a name for himself as a source on the fledgling casino industry in Massachusetts.
He's frequently been quoted as saying Massachusetts has the market for the three casinos the Massachusetts Gaming Commission is authorized to license in Massachusetts. He has also publicly doubted the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe will ever clear the federal hurdles necessary to open an Indian casino in Taunton or whether a bingo hall could ever generate enough traffic on Martha's Vineyard to earn the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) any profit.
After 27 years, Barrow said he will retire effective July 31, joining "several others" who he alleges have left in recent months having "grown tired of Chancellor Divina Grossman's habitually abusive treatment," according to his resignation statement.
University spokesman John Hoey denied the allegations and said Barrow's statement was riddled with "factual inaccuracies and misleading statements."
"I am known for telling the truth, and my colleagues will back me up," Barrow said.
"He is well known on campus for embellishing criticism of the administration and his fellow faculty members," Hoey said.
Hoey said he is not sure if it is a coincidence that Barrow's angst comes at a time when the administration has been asking "hard questions" about the finances of his center and "his relationship to his consultancy firm."
Barrow, whose salary is $185,000, said he has a signed letter of authorization from the UMass General Counsel's Office "authorizing my consulting activities as not being in conflict with my directorship of the Center for Policy Analysis" and that he has regularly filed quarterly conflict-of-interest statements with the provost's office since 2006 "and no one has ever raised a single question."
Barrow pointed to several faculty members who he said have "been pushed out" in recent months.
Grant O'Rielly, faculty senate president and physics professor, said people are leaving due to retirement or advancement in their careers.
"It is true that there are a number of senior faculty leaving the university this year, possibly more than in an average year, but this is not that unusual in any large organization," he said.
Hoey was unable to immediately provide a number for how many faculty members have left in the past year but said that many of them either retired or moved to better opportunities as is "the nature of the higher education market."
He said the university continues to look to hire qualified people "committed to transformative teaching, research and community engagement."
Times reporter George Brennan contributed to this story.
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