Encourage greater suspicion on the part of the public, press and government officials of the industrial connections of professors who write syndicated columns on nutrition (as do Stare and Mayer), who testify at legislative and executive hearings (as Stare has done extensively), and who sit on government advisory committees.
As a result of the Rosenthal-CSPI, the School of Public Health will begin this fall to consider asking its faculty members for some kind of catalogue of their outside work. Howard H. Hiatt '44, dean of the School, said earlier this month he plans to raise the suggestion before the administrative board, a panel which includes all departmental chairmen. Hiatt said having the list might be a "very health thing," although he added that making it public may not be wise. Both Stare and the acting chairman of the Nutrition Department, Robert P. Geyer, also said they have no objection to such a listing if it is not made public. Geyer added that he might support declassifying the forms if the data is used "in a responsible way." "If there is information that the food faddist types would use in some detrimental way, that would be bad," he added.
The authors of the Rosenthal-CSPI report argue against keeping such information confidential. Michael Jacobsen, co-director of the center, said earlier this month that such private records have proven useless, with lax standards and cronyism limiting enforcement.
Defending the Nutrition Department's use of corporate funds, Stare said virtually all such gifts are offered without restriction: a grant from a sugar company, for example, would not be for a particular research project.
As chairman, Stare said, he allocated the gifts either to the department's 19-year-old endowment, which now totals about $7 million, or to its fund for research and teaching, which is part of the department's annual operating budget. According to Stare, this constituted between 5 to 7 per cent of the operating budget of about $3 million, and much of it is used for student scholarships. Later in the year, after the department's budgetary needs grew more certain, Stare would transfer more of the gift money into the endowment. The total effect of this method, Stare argued, was to launder the funds. "Hardly anyone in the department knows where their money is coming from, except me," he said last week.
As chairman, Stare had an involved set of steps and strategies for deciding what outside funds and commitments to accept. He gave the department royalties from his books (such as Panic in the Pantry, whose sequel will be titled Danger in the Dining Room,) payment for his syndicated nutrition column, and editorial fees larger than about $500. The total given, he says, has amounted to about $100,000 over the last ten years.
But Stare retains the money he receives as a director of the packaging company, Continental Can (between $6000 and $7000), and as a retainer for Kellogg, Nabisco and the industry-supported Cereal Institute.
This money, which Stare says totals about $10,000 a year (a quarter of his University salary of $40,000), is the most controversial he handles: consumer advocates criticized these ties after his report to a Senate subcommittee in 1971 calling breakfast cereals "good foods" because they contain less saturated fat and cholesterol than other breakfast foods.
In fact, Stare does not jump at the chance to reveal his work for Kellogg and Nabisco. In the interview early last week he said he accepts no consulting fees and that he had received only travel expenses for his appearance before the Senate committee. When queried later in the week about the two retainers, Stare explained that he sees retainers as different from consulting fees; the latter are one-time payments, not a supplementary salary, he said. While he technically may not have accepted a fee for testifying at the hearings on behalf of Kellogg and Nabisco, he was on the companies' payrolls at the time.
Almost as controversial as these payments are Stare's fund raising methods, which have unquestionably made him the best fund raiser on the School of Public Health's faculty. In his attempts to get corporate grants, Stare said, he tells companies seeking more than a small bit of advice, "very bluntly, 'You know, I get so damn many requests for advice and consultation that I can only really devote my time to those companies that are willing to help our department. Now, if you'd like to make an initial gift of $1000, I'll be glad to talk with you and see what advice or help I can give to you." This may happen, Stare said, about ten times a year.
Sometimes, Stare said, he will tell companies asking him to appear at congressional or executive branch hearings that he is willing to do so if they send their fee for testifying--which he says he would never accept personally--to the department.
Stare's quid pro quo works the other way, too. If a company that has given funds to the department--and he cites Kellogg as one such corporation--requests his time, he will not seek a consulting fee for the department. "The companies that help support the department, I am perfectly willing to try to help them when I can do so in all honesty and without asking for any extra fees. I mean, after all, if a company is giving you $10,000 or $15,000, why try to get a few more pennies out of them? I'd much rather have the $10-$15,000 keep on coming every year ..."
Stare's fund raising strategy extends to his fairly extensive writing. He writes on occasion for magazines like Harper's Bazaar, he explains, for a very specific reason: "... you might wonder what the hell [I] have an article in Harper's Bazaar for, but it's a very influential magazine because women read it sitting under hair dryers, and many of these women are wives of important people and foundation executives."
Stare, who stepped down as chairman this year under a School of Public Health ceiling on the age of those performing administrative duties, sees no danger that his concern with raising money for the department might color his writing, teaching and testimony on nutrition. All corporations can expect from him, he says, is the truth.
Nor does he see his colleagues in the department restraining their criticism of donors or restricting their research into sensitive areas. "Sure, like every profession there are a few rotten apples in the barrel...that would sell their soul" for support, he says, "but there are damn few."