West Shore Board Moves Forward, Unburdened No Longer by Conscience

[XLFD]

At the end of the recent meeting of the WSCC where the board had just voted unanimously to grant a $240,000 figure in a separation agreement with President-in-turmoil Chuck Dillon to go with his regular retirement, and a $70,000 legal settlement of a matter involving Dillon's employment action on Julie Van Dyke,  Trustee Cowden had a few words regarding the general business of the meeting and the floor went to fellow trustee, Richard Wilson.  Richard Wilson serves as the City of Ludington's City Attorney for most matters, and has some explaining to do on a few recent issues (like overbilling the citizens of Ludington for services).  He said words before the vote that admitted the board was getting quite a deal:  "We are paying him $30,000 above what we owe him to resolve all claims that could be made for the college",  He then continued after the vote with his comments (my commentary in blue follows):

"I would echo what Ms. Cowden has said, of course, and congratulations to all the appointees.  Welcome aboard, and I guess, I guess we should sum it up and say I think we should take some credit for the fact we are able to wrap this whole matter involving President Dillon and Ms. Van Dyke up in a relatively short time for a public body, taking less than 90 days for both incidents; that's not outrageously long.  I think we have judiciously gone in the right direction and I believe we should give ourselves a little pat on the back, this not an issue any longer, its in the past, and I look forward to the process for searching for a new permanent president for this college and this institution which has had such a great history." 

 

Attorney Wilson's analysis is spoke like a true lawyer.  We settled the issue so that both Van Dyke and Dillon cannot bring it up any longer to the public, and we definitely won't revisit the issue.  Sure we spent a whole lot of public money doing it, but it now won't be brought back to haunt us.  We have paid the extortion money without telling our financiers what we were being threatened with.  If this wasn't sickening enough, Wilson was succeeded by Trustee Bruce Smith who said among other agonizing anguish he personally fought in coming to a reason to vote for the resolution in the last ten minutes, said: 

 

"I have wrestled with this since the process began.  Most people are aware of my feelings..."

 

Frankly, Mr. Smith, with all due respect that I have for you, I've been reading everything about this case, attending the meetings, and trying to get information from FOIA requests (which the college has been mostly forthright with so far except for the closed meeting minutes), but I have yet to hear or see how any of the trustees feel or think about anything regarding the case. 

Almost every sentence out of all college officials are couched in meaningless phrases and semantics about an 'incident' which they never name or elaborate on.  Their feelings or thoughts on the man involved in the 'incident' is never voiced, the use of the college van for the 'incident' is incidental, the money involved with getting rid of the problem is inconsequential.  He continues:

"I have never,never been in favor of rewarding bad behavior or performance, and I searched my soul, I tried to take my own advice when I'm dealing with my colleagues, my own children; it is sometimes that a person would rather be right than happy.  If I applied that to this decision in this case, I am not happy, but the vote was the right vote to take."

 

Unfortunately, he goes on thereafter to explain why it was and fails at it.  At best, he echoes Trustee Steve Urka who also had a few words before the vote saying that he didn't want to roll the dice with what the college could be faced with. 

 

And yet, we, the public, have had no evidence whatsoever of any liability the college is faced with in getting rid of Dillon.  It seems on the face of the 'Van Dyke Incident' (as of yet unrevealed) that the only liability the college may have is from how Dillon handled it.  Maybe he should pay Julie her $70,000 with his new nest egg?

 

The next two trustees to speak at the end of the meeting echoed the rosy rhetoric about this being such a good deal for everyone, and praised the leadership of their chairman James Jensen.  Good leadership of public bodies is apparently equated with keeping scandals suppressed, and then quietly paying away the problems with public dollars. 

 

The meeting which lasted nearly two hours had plenty of filler throughout, starting with an almost comical scene lasting several minutes where they were approving the minutes of three closed sessions from the 9-15 and special 10-02 meetings held and got confused over which one they were approving and receiving.   The two meetings involving Dillon lasted three hours, but both minutes were less than a one-sided page long, I noticed.

 

Enrollment and other stats were discussed in some detail:  credit hours taken are down 11.4% and enrollment is down 9.4%, both are more dramatic than forecast.  Yet, later on in the meeting Tom Mathison brought up a master plan to be incorporated for WSCC over the next few years involving a large host of construction projects that would first consider about $4.3 million of improvements to the Rec Center among the first of projects to be considered in a master plan with an ambitious schedule for millions of dollars in improvements in succeeding years amounting to $60 million.  Mayhaps, $310,000 in extortion money to former employees doesn't seem like a lot when you look at such figures. 

 

In between the reports and the master plan update, and at about the middle of the meeting, they allowed time for public comment.  I was the only one to take the floor, and I spoke my mind about what was happening.  Note that my comment addressed issues of the Open Meetings Act being violated, and the very WSCC's own policies were being ignored, just so these 'incidences' could be swept under the rug and out of the public's eye.  As long as the public does not know what happened behind the scenes and whether the board and their agents did indeed act properly, these 'incidents' will always be in front of them, not behind them.  Taking care of it honorably and openly would have saved the reputation of this college, now it is doomed to be remembered for caving into extortion:

"At the previous meeting this month, I alerted this board to the basic fact that they had broken the Open Meeting's Act three times since Chuck Dillon took the college van on a joyride.  This involved not noticing the last special meeting on its public website, and going into closed session at the August 11 and September 15 meetings without valid reasons given.  The acting president denies these facts, and I disagree without further argument at this point, but I will point out college policy to the board and its officers:

Section 10 09 A 6:  requires "Board members come to each meeting prepared and ready to debate issues fully and openly."

Subsection 9 of that section:  "the board endeavors to remain always accountable to the community."

Subsection 10:  "the board honestly debates the issues affecting the community."

 

Subsection B 1:  'the board must': debate and discuss issues in public'

 

There are plenty more high-minded ideals included in the rules that this college board is required to operate under because the taxpayers of five counties are stakeholders in the success of this body; but for some reason this board is not living up to these ideals, and other college officers are equally apathetic towards achieving these minimal standards of academic achievement in transparency and accountability.

 

This should explain the non-transparent arrogant attitude President Dillon displayed in his traffic stop where he lied about how much he had to drink, and flatly refused twice to answer what he was drinking, before failing miserably on counting backwards and reciting the alphabet.  He then continued that deception in this 'confidential' letter to the board executive committee, saying he brought along a beverage from home in a discreet container and consumed it during the program, once again leaving out the type of beverage and amount. 

 

To achieve his degree of drunkenness he would have had to have about a dozen drinks as defined by law, not a couple like he told the police officers.  His severance package that you will likely vote for and pass today, will reward him with $20,000 for each of those drinks he consumed that night along with normal retirement benefits for a person of his station.  Everything decided out of the view of the public.

 

The process of making sausages is not pretty, but if it were not for people like Upton Sinclair exposing the lack of safe and hygienic practices in the meatpacking industry to everyone in his book, The Jungle, about 100 years ago, the public might still be suffering from the lack of regulating the industry.  The same applies to public bodies like this Board of Trustees.  The people need to know what's going into the product, not just see the end result. 

I believe that honorable people are serving on the board, but they have been drowned out by bad urges, just like Dr. Dillon's common sense was on the night of August 6th.

 

Finally, how does the board settle the Dillon and Van Dyke problems?  With lots of public money and promises that the two people stay quiet about the college, and talk only positive if they do say anything.  This deal making is contrary to how this board was set up, contrary to the public interest, contrary to honorable conduct. 

 

Dirty laundry revealed gets cleaned in time, hidden dirty laundry stays dirty forever, until it's revealed. "

[AQUAMAN]

Great thread and public comment. What still bothers me again, is where is that "rules of conduct clause" in the President's employment contract? Many big executives, athletes, stars of stage and screen, endorsement people, all have it. And if there wasn't one previously, doesn't it ring any relevant bells to any Trustee that it should be included into the future? Perhaps for ALL employees, but esp. the kingpins? Prudent stewardship of any employee contract with such professionals, demands one, esp. in this day and age. Otherwise, this same mistake is to be repeated quite possibly, with the same results, that of the bad behavior being encouraged and not punishable to a reasonable conclusion. The reasonable conclusion should be that of firing, without any severance package at all, and all else lost too imho. Is it unreasonable to expect good and legal behavior from our leaders in academia nowadays? If so, why? No one else can do it in most parts of the private and public sector! 

[XLFD]

I must agree with you wholeheartedly, Aquaman.  And yet county commissions, city councils, college boards of trustees all hire administrators with contracts that have such generous clauses and perquisites to keep them in their posts as long as possible, and beholden to the governing body for doing so.  

Putting the gag order among the $310,000 in both settlements should make a red flag appear to anyone.  Back when I went to college, speaking freely on topics was the de rigueur of the day.  The jokers on the trustee panel talks of an incident, on Chuck Dillon's behavior, and then dance totally around anything that would give a clue so as to why the college needed to pay Ms. Van Dyke $70,000 for fear of violating their own directives.

[Willy]

Well done X. The Boards reaction only shows the arrogance of Dillon. His attorney must have laid out a scenario of what it would cost if his client chose to fight this even though his client caused this. If Dillon were an honorable man he would have stepped down and received no compensation except for any pension he may have earned. This only proves what a hypocritical self centered person Dillon is and the College is better off without him. As far as the Board, they should all be replaced for rolling over and revealing how spineless they are. It's a good thing they receive no compensation because they certainly deserve none if this is the type of decisions they make.

[XLFD]

As I remarked, the Board openly violated the Open Meetings Act on three separate occasions for him, held over four hours of closed sessions, and have been doing their best to limit what the public knows about both the Van Dyke and Dillon affairs, even when their directives say otherwise.  Dillon has shown his true motivations and when I get to the bottom of the Van Dyke 'resignation', I am sure it will not reflect any better on him.

[Paul Jensen]

It is just the good ol boys club, it is hard to be removed from the inner circles in west Michigan

[XLFD]

Very true, witness that the election tomorrow will have only two candidates for WSCC Board of Trustees (current chairman James Jensen and current trustee Anthony Fabaz to cover the two seats that expire for them.   How can things change when the same people remain on the governing board and they violate their own rules and the Open Meetings Act to avoid talking about the important stuff publicly, legally putting gag orders and sending publicly-funded hush-money to keep their image pristine and their tarnish hidden.