Del Mar Fair Manager Put on Paid Leave : Investigation: Action on complaints by employees comes the day before event’s opening.

Del Mar Fair general manager Roger Vitaich was placed on paid administrative leave Monday afternoon--on the eve of the fair’s opening--by his board of directors because of allegations of “improper conduct.”

The action was prompted by a single complaint of sexual harassment against Vitaich about a month ago--which grew in scope after the fair’s board of directors invited other employees to meet privately with them to air whatever grievances they also harbored.

The actual investigation into the allegations will be conducted by the state’s Department of Food and Agriculture, said Allan Royster, president of the board of the 22nd District Agricultural Assn., which operates the fairgrounds and sponsors the annual Del Mar Fair which, opens its 20-day summer run today.

Royster said the investigation will probably be completed within a month and that, in the meantime, Andrew Mauro, the fair’s second-ranking administrator, will take charge.

“I don’t think the public will notice a difference” in the operation of the fair, Royster said.

The investigation into the charges against Vitaich will be handled at the state level because the Department of Food and Agriculture oversees the state’s fairs and expositions.

Both Vitaich and Royster were tight-lipped about the charges against Vitaich, 53, who is in his 11th year as fair manager.

“It’s appropriate at this time that I don’t make any remarks, either on my own behalf or the fair’s,” said Vitaich, who begged off further comment.

Royster declined to discuss any of the allegations against Vitaich. “We don’t want to color any of Roger’s rights,” he said. “We just have one piece of the puzzle, and that doesn’t make a complete puzzle.”

Royster characterized the allegations against Vitaich in terms of “improper conduct” and “harassment,” but other fair employees, who have asked not to be identified, have said their complaints focused on sexual harassment.

Royster said the board, which met in emergency session, “did what we were required to do by the constitutional oaths we took.

“Roger took (the action) as you or I would take anything that would cause sadness after 11 years of employment,” Royster said. “And he took it as a gentleman.”

The board president would not say how many employees had come forward to privately lodge complaints about Vitaich, but noted that at least one of them was a man.

The board’s action followed a two-hour meeting in a conference room at a nearby hotel, after which Vitaich was beckoned from his offices for a 45-minute meeting with his bosses.

After that session, the board adjourned and Vitaich remained behind for more than an hour, meeting privately with two representatives of the Department of Food and Agriculture who explained the investigative process to him.

Longtime employees of the fair have refused to disclose their complaints against Vitaich, saying they have been sworn to secrecy by the board of directors. More than one person said that, if they talked, “we’d lose our jobs tomorrow.”

“Everything is really tense around here, and there are rumors everywhere,” said one. “We’re on edge anyway because the fair’s opening, and now we’ve got this.”

Vitaich has been roundly applauded for his successes at the fair, helping to turn it around from a financially strapped operation tainted for its tawdry carnival and side-show atmosphere, to a financially successful exposition with a renewed emphasis on agriculture, youth achievement and old-time country fair demonstrations, exhibits and family-oriented entertainment.