It's about time.
August 4, 2007 - On his first day, James Lowe, interim president of Bishop State Community College sent letters to 13 employees saying the Mobile college intended to fire them.
Ten of the employees to whom letters were sent Wednesday were charged in May by the District Attorney's Office with theft of financial aid. Two of the employees were associated with academic irregularities in the college food service program, according to records obtained by the Press-Register.BACKGROUND: Bishop State Community College is in Mobile, Alabama. Bishop State has been placed on probation by its accrediting agency. Former Chancellor Roy Johnson was fired by the state school board in July 2006 amid allegations of nepotism. Twenty-seven people associated with the college have been accused of stealing more than $200,000 in financial aid and sports program money. The former president, Yvonne Kennedy, was, more or less, forced to resign. Chancellor Bradley Byrne sent her notice recently that some perks negotiated during her "retirement" would be modified. He accused her of insubordination for refusing to fire one administrative employee - David Thomas.
The firings are symbolic. Except for David Thomas, the director of adult education and economic development, who was convicted on a hit and run charge and who was impeached from the Mobile County school board in 2006, Lowe expects the firings will be typical. ""I'm not concerned about our having an adequate basis" for termination, Byrne said. "I'm just concerned about this bizarre process and some of the bizarre results we've gotten from some of the arbitrators."
Double dipping is common, not as flagrant or as conspicuous as in New Jersey where corruption is an art form, but reporters found 40 members of the Legislature have direct or indirect financial ties to the colleges. Currently 13 legislators are also employed under Alabama's two-year college system. See The Huntsville Times editorial and the Press-Register editorial and the editorial of the Tuscaloosa News.
The new chancellor has also ordered the permanent closing of Bishop State Community College's Best Grill, a "culinary laboratory" that, as the Press-Register notes, "cooked up an astonishing $1.7 million in losses in a few years." (Two employees there were given termination intent letters. One was even listed as a student in his own class.)
Abstract from the Chronicle of Higher Learning on Bishop State Community College. (The entire report is behind a subscription wall, but you will get a good idea.)
Inside Higher Ed on probation for the two-year college.
