IT'S A MESS UNDER CSUN.

Byline: STEVE DILBECK

There's a scene in ``The Sting'' in which corrupt detective Charles Durn- ing is brought into a make- shift FBI office in a ware- house and acts impatient. FBI captain Dana Elcar barks at him to sit down and says: ``Try not to live up to all my expectations.''

But all too often, it happens. No matter how low the bar is set, somehow minimal expectations are met.

Cal State North- ridge, you've met them again.

CSUN is conduct- ing a search for an athletic director. And conducting it, and conducting it.

It's been almost a year since CSUN president Jolene Koester pushed Dick Dull out as AD, yet the position remains unfilled. Almost like athletics weren't actually a priority to her. Koester decided the original pool of AD applicants wasn't filled with enough potentially pliable candidates, so last week it was announced maybe it really would be best to utilize a professional search firm.

It gets more muddled.

The person the CSUN athletic director for some reason reports to is Mo Qayoumi, vice president of administration and finance. Earlier this month, Qayoumi was chosen as the new president of Cal State East Bay.

So now, we have interim athletic director Janet Lucas reporting to interim administration and finance vice president James Sullivan.

Wait, CSUN can muddle this even further.

Qayoumi also served as chairman of Koester's blue- ribbon athletics commission, which served up a 17-page report in March that is supposedly a map for the university's sports future. The man charged with overseeing the report's execution: Qayoumi. Best of luck charging forward without those recommendations.

What a sad, unsightly mess.

The coaches, athletes and students of Cal State Northridge deserve much more. More isn't coming, and right now, you'd have to be happy just for an effective AD.

Dull was largely that. He was never a charismatic figure, but he tried to make the most of what he was handed. He was always the good soldier, but apparently that wasn't enough.

Koester has essentially fired Dull twice in less than 12 months. First, she had him reassigned as athletic direct- or, creating a fundraising position that was supposed to raise $10 million for athle- tic-facility improvements.

Dull barely got 10 months in on his new job when Koester announced she would not renew his contract when it expires next month.

Her comment then -- ``Dick, I think has longed to be on the East Coast for a long time.'' -- was laughable. If Dull truly wanted to head East, he was free to go of his own volition at any time.

I would love to give you Koester's reaction, but she did not return phone calls.

Dull, 60, appears to have been treated very badly. He always seemed mismatched as fundraiser, and now the whole position seems a sham, mere prelude to not renewing his contract.

Fundraising at CSUN is politely termed challenging, but Dull had to run a silent campaign to generate new dollars, and that's crossing from challenging into impossible territory.

John Chandler, Koester's spokesman, said the university doesn't keep track of fundraising by individuals and could not announce how much revenue Dull had generated. The only other official CSUN athletic fund- raising position belonged to Kevin Sims, the assistant AD of development. Sims also recently left, apparently meeting the same fate as Dull. Chandler said it was unclear if Dull's position would be filled, or combined with Sims' old job.

There's just commitment all over the place at CSUN.

What Koester is committed to is building a $100 million performing arts center.

Koester wants to raise $50million for the arts center, expecting to get an equal amount through a bond issue. So far, Chandler said CSUN has $9 million in commitments. If the school were to build a new arena/ recreational facility, it might be used by 80 percent of the student body. A new arts center would be utilized by 10 percent? Twenty?

But Koester is into the arts, not sports. A new arena would revitalize a sports program that has mostly struggled since taking the leap from NCAA Division I-AA to Division I in 1990.

Her own blue-ribbon committee said such an arena would ``benefit all students.'' Her own hand- picked committee said intercollegiate sports can bring a ``kind of esprit de corps for a university, bring- ing greater attention, enthu- siasm and support for the broader spectrum of univer- sity endeavors, especially its core academic programs.''

At least the committee gets it. Earlier, different parties from the private sector tried to form a joint venture with Los Angeles for a new CSUN baseball stadium that had the city discussing a $4 million contribution, and a soccer parent wanted to donate $250,000 worth of lights for the soccer field, but both proposals died on the Koester vine. Almost like she fears every dollar donated to athletic facilities is a dollar lost to her performing arts center.

Meanwhile, the AD search painfully drags on, living up to all our expectations.