SIRTI director Tam quits

Patrick Tam, a high-powered executive hired two years ago to guide the Spokane Intercollegiate Research and Technology Institute, announced his resignation Thursday.

Tam, 56, will get a six-month severance deal as part of his agreement to step down from his job as SIRTI’s executive director.

Tam was hired in July 2002 after a national search. Since taking the $140,000-a-year job, Tam has been credited with sharpening the focus and profile of SIRTI, a state-funded agency that provides help to growing technology companies.

But complaints about his management style dogged Tam in recent months. In September, SIRTI board members announced an investigation into “allegations of inappropriate behavior by Director Tam.” For the past eight weeks, Tam has been on paid leave pending the outcome of the investigation. SIRTI Board Chairwoman Nancy Isserlis declined to give specific reasons for the board’s action, saying she would not comment on personnel matters.

In the past week, the Bellevue, Wash., attorney who conducted the investigation made a report to the board, she said. “It was Dr. Tam who offered us his resignation,” she added.

Tam couldn’t be reached for comment Thursday.

As part of the deal, Tam will provide assistance and advice to the SIRTI board on some of the organization’s ongoing projects. Those include the soon-to-be-built SIRTI technology center and a loan fund to help companies buy products and supplies.

Started 10 years ago, SIRTI has evolved from an agency that tried to match university researchers with companies to become a business-service provider and business incubator. The agency employs 16 and has a $1.3 million annual budget.

Before joining SIRTI, Tam headed several technology-based companies, served as president of the Washington Research Foundation – the technology-transfer arm of the University of Washington – and, most recently, held a key job with ARRAE International, a Seattle company that commercialized products derived from research conducted at Chinese universities.

When SIRTI hired Tam in 2002, board members believed he was an ideal fit and an improvement over previous directors, who had primarily come out of higher education to take that job.

“We saw him as someone who would run SIRTI like a business and be accountable to the taxpayers,” Stu Stiles, a board member who was involved in Tam’s selection in 2002, said when he was hired.

Tam’s resignation came as a thumping sour note during a year that featured two high points for SIRTI. In February, SIRTI was the showcase site for a visit to the region by the secretaries of the federal Labor, Commerce and Treasury departments. National media crowded into the SIRTI building while Tam escorted the D.C. dignitaries around the building, showing them the promising new companies working there.

Then, in August, Tam and other SIRTI officials received confirmation that the agency had scored two major federal grants, totaling $4.8 million, for technology projects.

SIRTI’s new technology center, to be built on land near the Riverpoint Higher Education Park at the east end of downtown Spokane, received a $3 million federal grant to move the project forward. And SIRTI’s “technology growth fund” will use $1.8 million in federal dollars to provide a revolving fund available to companies that need money to buy supplies and take care of new orders.

But Tam’s tenure also started showing signs of stress.

In the last two months, two former managers hired by Tam filed claims against the state, alleging that they lost their jobs at SIRTI due to retaliation and workplace stress caused by Tam. State attorneys said they will not comment on those claims, filed by David Wingate and Kenny Spain. Both left SIRTI earlier this year, and Isserlis said the claims had nothing to do with Tam’s suspension.