Today, FAMU trustees reversed one of their previous votes just days after Gov. Rick Scott pressured them to do so.The FAMU board announced the appointment of an Anti-Hazing Committee on Feb. 9. The committee’s mission was to come up with “findings and recommendations to be presented to the FAMU Board of Trustees for consideration and approval.”
On March 23, trustees approved the committee’s request to change its mission from a policy recommendation committee to a fact-finding committee. The vote permitted the committee to operate without the public notice requirements of Florida’s Sunshine Law. Committee members asked for the change in order to help them work more quickly and meet the board’s deadline for its report.
Scott asked FAMU trustees to change their vote on March 27. He said he personally wanted the committee to do all of its work at open meetings.
"It is my hope that the Board of Trustees reconsiders its decision and reverses it,” Scott said in a letter to FAMU’s trustees.
FAMU Trustee Torey Alston introduced a motion at a conference call this afternoon that did exactly what the governor wanted. The motion passed with an 8-2 vote.
Before the vote, Anti-Hazing Committee Chairman Stephen Craig Robinson said he was offended by accusations that the panel asked for the mission change because it wanted to be secretive. He said publicly noticing every phone conversation or email would slow the committee down from meeting the deadline for its report.
“I take offense at the notion that people would suggest that I am doing what I am doing to be secretive,” Robinson said. “We have our good names and reputations on the line.”
Robinson said that he and four of the other Anti-Hazing Committee members would resign if trustees voted to change the committee’s mission.
Trustee Rufus Montgomery responded by saying: “That’s akin to a child saying I’ll take my toys and go home.”
“Go ahead and resign!” Montgomery yelled to Robinson.
Alston also addressed concerns that the board’s decision to reverse its previous vote following pressure from the governor’s office would lead to an accreditation problem.
Comprehensive Standard 3.2.4 of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) states that each member institution’s governing board must be “free from undue influence from political, religious, or other external bodies and [protect] the institution from such influence.” SACS previously scolded Scott for trying to pressure FAMU trustees to suspend President James H. Ammons.
“I have not been influenced by any forces,” Alston said.
"Yes" votes: Torey Alston, Bill Jennings, Chuck Badger, Charles Langston, Kelvin Lawson, Breyon Love, Spurgeon McWilliams, and Rufus Montgomery.
"No" votes: Belinda Shannon and Karl White.