(CNN) -- The Atlanta Hawks organization's issues with race go beyond one inflammatory email or offensive comments on one conference call, the team's CEO said, before promising fans that those systemic problems will be corrected. 

"As an organization, we must own these shortcomings and failures," Steve Koonin wrote in an open letter Saturday to his team, fans and the city of Atlanta. "... We should build bridges through basketball, not divide our community or serve as a source of pain." 

Koonin's comments come a day after general manager Danny Ferry began an indefinite leave of absence tied to controversial comments he made in June about Luol Deng, then a prospective free agent player. And they occurred six days after the franchise's owner, Bruce Levenson, announced he would sell his controlling interest team in light of a 2012 email that many derided as racist. 

In the same announcement last Sunday setting the stage for Levenson's exit, the NBA said that Koonin will oversee team operations during the ownership transition. 

The Hawks CEO did not mention Levenson or Ferry specifically in his letter Saturday, nor did he delve into detail into their or possible other cases. But he did say that "we enough today, based on investigations conducted by the league, by external legal counsel on behalf of the team and information that has appeared in the media, that our shortcomings are beyond a single email, a single person or a single event. 

"To the contrary, over a period of years, we have found that there have been inflammatory words, phrases, inferences and innuendos about race," Koonin said. 
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