EDITORIAL : NOT SO FAST; THE PROBLEMS WITHIN CSUN'S ATHLETIC DEPARTMENT ARE NOT OVER JUST BECAUSE THE INTERIM PRESIDENT SAYS THEY ARE.

TO say that the athletic department at California State University, Northridge, is free of problems just because a scathing internal report on the football program has been released is an elementary-school answer to a college-level question.

But that's exactly how interim university President Louanne Kennedy characterized the situation last week. ``This is over. We're ready to go forward.''

Not so fast.

This is not over.

CSUN has been a festering bed of athletic impropriety and scandal for years.

To wit: a women's volleyball coach is accused of sleeping with his players, in 1993; a football player is shot at a party and the athletic department covers it up, claiming the athlete had an appendectomy, in 1995; the women's basketball coach is arrested at a gymnasium on campus and charged with trafficking cocaine, in 1998.

On top of that, the university has been fighting with neighbors over an on-campus stadium that is required as part of the football team's membership in the Big Sky Conference.

CSUN's difficulty meeting federally mandated gender-equity rules for athletics forced the university to drop baseball and men's soccer, leaving those student-athletes in a tremendous bind. Ultimately, the sports were reinstated. Nonetheless, the school is still dealing with the gender-equity law.

Now comes the report on the football program, which excoriates ousted football coach Ron Ponciano for such things as allegedly handing in dubious travel receipts, failing to oversee the team's ad hoc booster club and trying to fire two assistant coaches Ponciano believed were snitching on him.

Getting rid of Ponciano may have been the appropriate response to begin the process of restoring credibility to the athletic program, but by no stretch of the imagination is it the last.

The university report still must be reviewed by the NCAA, which has a propensity to impose tough penalties for violations that schools consider minor.

From the looks of things, CSUN's proposed self-imposed penalties are incredibly light. Athletic Director Dick Dull suggested cutting the number of scholarships by two, to 61, for two seasons, and reducing expense-paid recruiting visits by five, to 20, for this season.

Institutionally, the school fumbled the ball from the moment it joined the Big Sky and started competing at the highest level of college sports, Division 1A.

It just wasn't ready for prime time.

University officials have failed miserable in providing oversight of its sports program, particularly football. It permitted the team's unofficial booster club, the Quarterback Club, to host barbecues for players and recruits, in violation of NCAA rules. (The players are being forced to pay about $20 in fines for the meals or risk being declared ineligible for the upcoming season.)

Ponciano claims the school knew about the QB Club but never questioned his participation in it. And former Athletic Director Paul Bubb, who resigned in the aftermath of the drug-trafficking arrest of women's basketball coach Michael Abraham, acknowledged he was ``probably not as forceful'' as he should have been in dealing with the boosters.

In order for CSUN to officially declare this mess over and done with, administrators need to show they have the financial and management controls needed to ensure sports is kept in proper perspective. Strict guidelines regarding contact between coaches and recruits and boosters and players must be followed, and violations must be dealt with sternly.

CSU Chancellor Charles Reed ought to make this a requirement of the university's next president.

Athletics are part of the university culture, and thus far the culture at CSUN has been marred by deceit and lack of oversight. The systemic problems in the football program ought to get everyone thinking about how much CSUN needs it.

From what we've seen, interim President Kennedy needs to act decisively now and take a step back in order to move forward.

Unless she can show CSUN is capable of the big time, it must seriously consider pulling out of the Big Sky and dropping football.

The burden of taking a different course is on her and other administrators.