In a shocking display of decorum, there were no rants, no tirades, no emotional debates nor controversial votes. In fact, things were downright civil up until the end of the Board of Regents meeting last week at the Desert Research Institute, when just under half the board walked out.
First, though, the board quickly and unanimously approved a fee increase at UNR for the school to renovate its student union.
What's so bad about that?
The move left UNLV reps in shock, after they spent the majority of 2003 trying to convince the regents that a similar fee increase to renovate UNLV's student union was necessary. While the fee hike eventually passed, the fact that UNR's was approved with such relative ease—exactly a year after UNLV's proposal was delayed at a Carson City meeting to hear from students at Las Vegas—surprised many in the audience.
Equally surprising was Regent Linda Howard, who after a year of keeping a fairly low profile, went back on the attack, this time all but saying UNLV discriminated in its hiring of basketball coach Lon Kruger.
Howard said to UNLV athletic director Mike Hamrick that boosters were upset by the way the process was handled, that there was a lack of diversity in the field of candidates, and there were instances where regents were disrespected by donors. She was also upset that black alumni were not considered.
Presumably, Howard was referring to former Rebels Sidney Green and Reggie Theus, although she didn't name names. If that's the case, though, neither met the requirements set by Hamrick and UNLV President Carol Harter.
In eight seasons as a college coach, Green's record is 84-145, a far cry from the winning record the school was looking for. Theus, an assistant coach at Louisville, has never served as a head coach at the collegiate level—and, in any case, is not an alumni of UNLV. He received his bachelor's in 2002 from California Coast University, a distance-learning school for adults who never finished their bachelor's degree.
Howard cast the lone dissenting vote in the approval of Kruger's contract. The board has to approve all contracts of more than three years.
The last bit of hysterics came late Friday, when regents Bret Whipple, Tom Kirkpatrick, Doug Seastrand, Jill Derby and Doug Hill walked out of the meeting just before a discussion on whether demoted CCSN President Ron Remington could transfer to UNLV.
"The chancellor had recommended that Dr. Remington return to faculty at CCSN in the psychology department, as a full professor, instead of taking advantage of a situation which would have been dynamite, which would have been to move to UNLV, into the college of education, to cover higher education leadership at the community college level," said Dr. Howard Rosenberg, one of two regents from Reno. "For some strange reason, the chancellor agreed to it twice—in two e-mails produced she told Dr. Remington she thought it was a great idea, then for some reason the chancellor changed her mind."
The remaining regents voted 5-2 to approve the transfer to UNLV. Some of the five speculated publicly that the others were trying to block the vote by stopping the board from having quorum. Not so, said Whipple.
"I had an appointment, I had a 5 o'clock business appointment," Whipple said, adding that the two northern regents who left, Derby and Hill, had flights to catch back to Reno.
Elko Regent Marcia Bandera had already left the meeting.
Plot or not, the board may reconsider the transfer approval at its next meeting, a meeting that Rosenberg said hopefully will continue with the positive tone.
"I think we're getting a little more comfortable with one another, even though we disagree," he said. "I am really looking forward to the workshop. Something happens in workshop where a lot of regents let down their guard."
The regents workshop, which is designed to help the board build character and rapport with one another, takes place this May in Mesquite.