Lowe clears out desk at Dollar General

Challis M. Lowe, who served as FAMU’s Board of Trustees chairwoman from 2005 to 2007, has stepped down as Dollar General’s executive vice president of human resources. Her departure came in wake of a sweeping corporate reorganization that left at least two other high-ranking senior executives without jobs.

Lowe was one of the biggest supporters of former Interim President Castell Bryant, defending her even as her administration received the first and only qualified state audits in FAMU’s history.

Alumni-led efforts to hold Lowe accountable for her poor oversight attracted fierce opposition from the St. Petersburg Times’ editorial board. When alumnus and state Senator Alfred “Al” Lawson pointed out that Lowe’s appointment had not met the deadline for Florida Senate confirmation, Times editorial writers accused him of “political interference.”

But much to the disappointment of Lowe’s backers on the Board of Governors and the Times editorial staff, Lawson succeeded in blocking the then-chairwoman’s reappointment in April, 2007. Two months later, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools verified that FAMU’s BOT had been asleep-at-the-wheel during the Lowe-era, citing the lack of an “active policy-making body” as one of the reasons behind its decision to place FAMU on probation.