Chancellor, regent run into a fiery college faculty

Jennifer Knight

Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2003 | 8:55 a.m.

University system Chancellor Jane Nichols and Board of Regents Chairman Stavros Anthony took to the campuses of the Community College of Southern Nevada Tuesday to try to soothe faculty angered by the removal of their president.

Regent Linda Howard stood alongside faculty Tuesday in her criticism of last week's board action, which led to the demotion of both Ron Remington as president in a 7-6 vote and of John Cummings, his adviser and lobbyist, in a 9-4 vote.

Anthony told a room of about 100 faculty at CCSN's West Charleston campus that, "At no point did anyone come to me and say they wanted to speak to the board."

Howard fired back at Anthony.

"I will not sit here and allow you to tell that lie," Howard said, noting that Cummings and Remington had waited in a room outside the meeting for nearly nine hours hoping to talk to the board.

A similar meeting at CCSN's Cheyenne campus was more calm, but faculty members offered much of the same criticism, wondering why Remington or Cummings were not allowed to face the board and answer the allegations against them.

"This was not the best way to do this," Nichols said. "It absolutely would have been better to have Ron Remington brought in. Why was it done this way? I don't know."

Anthony said the board took action to protect CCSN's reputation.

"You just can't sweep this under the rug," Anthony said at the Cheyenne campus meeting. "We're talking about the integrity of this institution."

But Dick McGee, a performing arts professor, and others maintained that more harm that good has come out of the vote.

"The point is, we don't have the information we need, and our president and friend, Ron Remington is gone," McGee said. "Real harm has been done here. For the past week this institution has been a mess."

Candace Kant, the president of Nevada Faculty Alliance said the institution now faces an uncertain future.

"Progress in my opinion is at a standstill for the next two years as far as I'm concerned," Kant said. "And what kind of pool (of presidential candidates) are we going to get. Who would apply? This college is hell. It sickens me. It really sickens me."

Nichols and Anthony said they are now working with university system lawyers to try and release the 1,000-page report prepared by private investigator Jeffrey Cohen.

The report came out of a complaint filed by Topazia "Briget" Jones, a CCSN secretary who called herself the "special assistant" to Assemblyman Wendell Williams, D-Las Vegas.

Jones, who was hired, fired and then reinstated by the college, alleged that the college lobbyist circumvented the board by using her influence over Williams to create a bill that would have made CCSN a four-year institution.

Anthony ended the session by recounting an incident that had happened at the meeting at the West Charleston campus where a woman asked why former President Richard Moore was not fired for the many things that had been found in an attorney general's investigation.

"I said should he have been for that and she said, 'Yes.' " Anthony said. "That told me right there that I had made the right decision (about removing Remington)."