Editorial: Regents should call off ‘witch hunt’

CC board should return focus to needs of students

Clarendon College Regents need to come together to focus on doing what’s best for students and push back against the combative stance a minority of the board is taking against the administration.

The growing rift between Regents Jerry Woodard and Darlene Spier and President Robert Riza was on full display when the college board had its regular meeting last month. The conflict has been growing for more than two years and amplified after the college’s accrediting body a year ago said Woodard had to step down as board chairman due to a conflict of interest as the president of the college’s depository bank.

Following that, Woodard began making a habit of presenting a laundry list of questions for the administration, and Riza last month complained of the “ambush jobs” his administration has been subjected to. In December, Riza told the board that the “witch hunts” had to end and said that he had lost two vice presidents in the last year because of it, referring to the departures of Vice President of Academic Affairs Brian Fuller and Vice President of External Affairs Ashlee Estlack.

“Both were under 40, enrolled in doctoral programs, and wanted to make their careers at Clarendon College,” the president said at that time.
Spier last month objected to Riza’s “ambush job” comment and said, “We’re not after you or any employee.” But her actions, and that of Woodard’s, contradict that statement. In fact, in the last two years, administration members have said privately they felt they should take turns wearing a vest with a target on it when they attend meetings.

Last September, what should have been a short meeting was marked instead by a roasting of the president that lasted more than an hour. Two regents were absent from that meeting, and five others sat mute as Woodard and Spier tag-teamed an assault on Riza’s management of the college, ignoring the administration’s record setting enrollments and top rankings in the state for graduation rates and student success and focusing instead on what Spier called “a pattern” of overspending in the last five years.

That of course begs the question, if the college has really been overspending, then why would it take five years for these two – a banker and a 30-plus-year college secretary – to say something? And if we’re really concerned about spending, why would Woodard, as chairman of the board in 2017, rush to purchase the Deyhle house in an illegal “emergency” meeting and spend almost a quarter of a million dollars? If we’re so worried about spending, why did the board unanimously give Riza permission to buy buses last March without even discussing prices!

To be sure, there are patterns at Clarendon College… a pattern of board members violating or flaunting the Open Meetings Act and college policy and a pattern of hostility that has simmered and occasionally bubbled over between these two regents and the president for over two years. Nothing the president or his administration seems to do can please them.
Woodard and Spier have asked for a number of reports that exemplifies their lack of confidence in the president, and they have developed a pattern of belittling not just the president but members of his team. College board meetings that have historically been a picture of professionalism and decorum have become monthly fishing expeditions as two board members seem to do their best to “catch” the president or members of his team.

Over a year ago, Estlack was asked to compile a report of required postings on the college website, after Woodard blamed her for certain financial reports not being posted online. The report presented last February ended up being 65 pages long and showed more than 70 people contribute content to the website, and that more than 30 reports are required by the state or other agencies. The financial reports in question were not posted on time because they had not been created by the then vice president of administrative services when they were required.

Estlack later was assigned to report on late filings and other issues with the college’s retirement and benefit contributions to the state, even though the administration had months earlier fixed those issues with the state. But when her report found that the college’s past filing problems were not just under the previous vice president of administrative services, whom Riza had hired, but in fact stretched back more than ten years, she was told by Spier at the board meeting last March to “Quit digging, honey.”

Last February, while regents did okay a raise for Riza, Woodard and Spier purposefully led the board in not extending his contract, only to have the rest of the board – led by Jack Moreman and Ruth Robinson – stand up to them in April and vote to add a year to Riza’s contract. Moreman at the time accused “that end of the table” – referring to Woodard, Spier, and Edwin Campbell – of violating the Open Meetings Act in February by having “a meeting within a meeting”

In June, the college’s attorney gave an excellent training on the Open Meetings Act and the proper role of the board. Woodard was absent, and Spier apparently just didn’t get it.

In July, CC Vice President of Administrative Services Rit Christian recommended that the board accept the depository bid of Happy State Bank and enumerated the reasons why Happy’s bid was the best of the three presented (primarily higher interest rates for CDs and lower fees). Woodard, who is president of the local branch of Herring Bank, persuaded his fellow board members to keep the college’s deposits at Herring and then proceeded to treat the financial officer like dirt beneath his shoe at subsequent meetings. Woodard did abstain from the vote, but two other members with a financial interest in the bank did not.

Just five months prior to that, in resigning as the board chairman under the pressure from the Southern Association of Colleges & Schools, Woodard asserted that he always recuses himself from discussions involving Herring Bank’s contract.

Following an August meeting, Spier stayed around after all other regents had left and spent half an hour lecturing Christian and Estlack on how to prepare financial reports “the way it used to be done.” When Spier finished, Estlack asked her if they (the administration) did it her way, what would be the next thing she and Mr. Woodard would want. Spier acted bewildered and said she didn’t know what Estlack was talking about. Estlack then used the term “witch hunt” and said she was tired of being treated as incompetent or as if the administration had something to hide. Later that month, Spier and Woodard stalled Riza’s recommendation to promote Estlack to a vice president, resulting in the board tabling a president’s personnel recommendation for the first time in the 20+ years the Enterprise has been covering regents’ meetings. The promotion was granted at a subsequent meeting when Woodard was absent.

The atmosphere with the board became so toxic that Riza in August told other administrators they no longer had to attend the regents’ meetings. And why should they attend? It is surely frustrating to work hard at your job day in and day out and build a record of success that is being talked about by other community colleges and in the halls of Austin, only to have two people show up once a month and rain on everything you’re working to accomplish.

Last fall, Woodard started beating a dead horse from a year earlier, called into question the president’s authority to sign any purchase contracts. The issue is a contract for copier/printer services that the college prematurely canceled when the former vice president of administrative services believed it was a month-to-month agreement. The college ended up paying $30,000 in the fall of 2017 to get out of the contract. Riza reported it at the time, it was deemed an honest mistake, and everyone moved on… all while Woodard was chairman. But now it’s a “thing” and it came up again last month.

Woodard also chastised Riza last fall for replacing the washer and dryer at the college president’s house, saying “any change to that house requires board approval.”

So in his view, if the college-owned dryer goes out (which it did), the president can’t replace it without a board meeting so Woodard and Spier can presumably have their input on whether to get a Whirlpool or a Maytag.

In October, Estlack addressed the board in open comments and informed them that she had filed a criminal complaint against the board for Open Meetings violations as well as an employee grievance against the board, a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and a formal complaint against the board with the Southern Association of Colleges & Schools, all related to the board’s treatment of her as an employee and the board members’ repeated violations of state law and college policy. All of the above complaints are still pending. Estlack later resigned in December when conditions did not improve.

Contrary to Spier’s assertion that they aren’t after anybody, time and time again they show an attitude that the president and his staff are incompetent. Just last month, Woodard pushed to have Spier compile the board’s evaluation of the president, dismissing Riza’s plan to have a staff member do that. Historically that’s a staff job, and the Enterprise knows of no instance in which former regent, the late Delbert Robertson, ever complied such evaluations in his decade’s long service as board secretary. It was fine to have the staff compile the evaluations… when Spier was the staff doing it. But then it’s also interesting that there was no consternation about the keeping of the minutes during Robertson’s time as board secretary.

Spier has a bit of a problem living in the present. She doesn’t like the way the college invests money now, even stating that it would cause former CC president Kenneth Vaughan – who retired in 1989 and died in 2011 – to roll over in his grave. Clarendon College, like most businesses, has changed considerably in the last 30 years, and even the last ten or five years have seen quite an evolution.

Almost all of the financial information presented in the president’s report at February’s meeting regarding what depleted the college’s cash reserves was previously presented by Riza at the October meeting, but he correctly stated at the time that what he told them didn’t matter “because you aren’t going to believe me anyway.” Apparently he’s right, since the same questions keep coming up.

CC is a huge enterprise requiring specialized knowledge to operate. It can’t be totally controlled by a board meeting once a month. The board can and should govern, but it needs to understand its limits.

From the discussion at last month’s meeting, it’s clear that the arguments of Woodard and Spier have gotten traction with at least two other board members as they work to kill this administration by a thousand pin pricks.

Whatever is eating these two – bruised egos, feelings of inadequacy or irrelevancy, or a desire for control – it needs to be put aside. Clarendon College is this community’s most valuable asset, and it is too important to let two people yank the reins and put the cart in the ditch by running off qualified employees, violating the law and college policy, and risking the college’s accreditation. Above all they need to stop accusing the administration of violating policies when they themselves can’t seem to follow policy or state law.

If they can’t swallow their pride and let the administration do its job, then the other board members need to rise to the occasion, stop sitting silently, and get the focus back on what is best for the college. And if they can’t get that done, then it’s time to start looking for new board members who can.