EDITORIAL: Trustees push NIC closer to big plunge

If you’re an attorney and you get a call out of the blue from North Idaho College, you can pretty much go out and buy that new sports car without worrying about making the massive payments.

But let’s aside for a moment the NIC board of trustees’ latest decision to further enrich the legal profession, the men and women with JD after their names who received more than half a million bucks last year — $511,404 — with the spigot still wide open to the tune of $19,511 in February billings.

With loss of accreditation staring straight at trustees Mike Waggoner, Todd Banducci and Greg McKenzie, the board majority probably is correct in finally seeking actual legal expertise. But leave it to those three to do the right thing in such a wrong way that they’re likely hastening the college’s demise rather than averting it.

The 3-2 decision to hire a Washington, D.C., law firm with no spending limit had apparently been in the works for a year — without the knowledge of trustees Brad Corkill and Tarie Zimmerman, who voted against it after learning of the deal one day before Thursday’s special meeting. 

The college’s accrediting agency, the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities, has repeatedly cited trustees’ poor communication as one of the areas most needing improvement if accreditation is to be saved. 

Yet when Zimmerman asked Chair Waggoner why all five trustees couldn’t have a week to consider the agreement, then meet, talk about it and then vote, Chair Waggoner referred mysteriously to “a number of things that have happened in the last week that are confidential” as justification for a rushed vote — with Zimmerman and Corkill completely left out of forming the agreement.

“This college is in trouble entirely because of board behavior, board governance,” Corkill said. “This action today and not including me in any of this communication prior to this meeting is a glittering example of that bad governance.”

The admonition fell on three sets of deaf ears, as it has for the years leading up to NIC’s accreditation judgment day.

Another key failing of the board majority emphasized by NWCCU as requiring dramatic improvement is its professional relationship with NIC President Nick Swayne. After failing to get rid of Swayne, which led to the president’s successful lawsuit and full reinstatement, the trustee trio was at it again in the special meeting.

Despite verbal assurances that Swayne would be allowed to speak directly with the D.C. lawyers and that the president would be able to fulfill his fiduciary responsibilities in signing off on any legal bills, the trustee trio refused to put it in writing as an amendment to the agreement.

While not his most eloquent comment of the night, a clearly frustrated Dr. Swayne was right when he said:

“You guys are setting yourselves up for another lawsuit for … interfering with things like my contract, violating fiduciary responsibilities and you say you’re doing this to get accreditation but the accreditation guys are looking at this like ‘You guys are frickin’ crazy.’”

Does NIC need help to save accreditation? No doubt, even though the least costly and most effective route would be the immediate resignations of Waggoner, Banducci and McKenzie.

Yet those three can't help themselves — or anyone else. They continue to model bad governance to the point that even the best lawyers might not be able to save North Idaho College.