KING OF PRUSSIA — A plan designed to soothe angry Penn State University alumni might instead be sowing seeds of outrage.

School President Rodney Erickson appeared Thursday night at a hotel near Philadelphia at the second of three town hall events, and alumni weren't exactly rolling out the red carpet for him.

Former Penn State and pro football star Franco Harris scheduled a competing event at the King of Prussia hotel after broad dissatisfaction with Erickson's first talk in Pittsburgh on Wednesday. A third event is scheduled for Friday in New York.

But even some critics say Erickson shouldn't be getting all the blame for what many view as a floundering public relations effort.

He's trying to repair the school's image more than two months after the arrest of former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky on sexual abuse charges brought controversy, criticism and contemplation to Happy Valley.

A 2002 alumnus, Ryan Bagwell, who's seeking a trustee seat in voting that will start next week, said Erickson “takes his marching orders from the board of trustees,” which “sent him out on this three-day spree.”

“We want to hear from the trustees. We want them to explain why they made the decisions they did,” Bagwell said. “Their silence is just incredible. It just keeps getting worse.”

The chairman and vice chairman of the board of trustees released a statement Thursday evening responding to questions raised at the Pittsburgh meeting, including about the firing of legendary football coach Joe Paterno. Paterno, they said, was removed in November instead of being allowed to retire after the season because of “extraordinary circumstances.”

“The details of his retirement are being worked out and will be made public when they are finalized,” said the statement from Chairman Steve Garban and Vice Chairman John Surma. “Generally speaking, the University intends to honor the terms of his employment contract and is treating him financially as if he had retired at the end of the 2011 football season.”

“I don't think there was any graceful way to handle that problem,” said John Burness, a former senior vice president of public affairs for Cornell University, Duke University and the University of Illinois.

Harris, who played for Paterno from 1968 to 1971 before helping the Pittsburgh Steelers win four Super Bowls, castigated the board of trustees for showing “no courage” by firing the longtime coach.