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Kelly Mori writes about health and higher education.Home > Blogs > On Campus > Archives > 2008 > May > 09
Friday, May 9, 2008
Last-minute deal for Antioch College collapses
YELLOW SPRINGS — The Antioch College Continuation Corporation, the alumni group that has tried to negotiate deals with Antioch University trustees to keep the college open next year, said today that trustees rejected its 11th-hour offer of money in exchange for board seats. This is the second time the board voted down an ACCC offer, and the second time it has “reaffirmed” its June 2007 decision to temporarily shutter the campus. The failed negotiations has both sides pointing fingers at the other as the culprit.
The ACCC offered a large donation — $9.5 million immediately and then another $6 million for other university campuses — in exchange for 10 seats on the 19-member board of trustees, which would have given it a majority vote, it said. The college could continue operating, the group said, while allowing the board more time to legally separate the college from the university.
Eric Bates, co-chair of the ACCC and an Antioch alum, said the following in a press statement:
“It almost defies belief that the trustees could reject this extraordinarily generous offer by a group of major donors,” he said. “We were not only prepared to make an immediate contribution of $9.5 million for Antioch College, we offered to make an additional contribution of $6 million for the direct benefit of the University’s five other campuses. This was a win-win opportunity for the entire University, and the trustees squandered it.”
The university, in its released statement, said it voted Thursday, May 8 against the ACCC proposal because because it would have resulted in the forced resignation of existing trustees and create an “untenable” leadership structure for the remaining five-campus system. It seems to have hinged on one trustee. The university was concerned about ceding control of the university to the ACCC. It also said the ACCC plan still lacked a business plan with financial benchmarks - one of their original beefs with the first ACCC plan.
Antiochians meanwhile accuse the university’s chancellor, Toni Murdock, of running out the clock. And a group known as Non-Stop Antioch said Friday it will support faculty whose contracts end June 30 and their efforts to keep teaching an Antioch education somewhere in Yellow Springs. Former Antioch College development officers are managing the College Revival Fund and about $16 million in cash and pledges for the effort. The group has opened an office in Yellow Springs and plans to slap the university with lawsuits.
Keep reading for the key points of the ACCC plan.
According to the ACCC statement, key points of its proposal included:
• Ensuring that the eventual separation of Antioch College would be done in a manner that protects the University’s accreditation and financial security • Ending the annual subsidies each campus currently pays to the College • Guaranteeing that funds from other campuses would not be used to offset any operating expense or deficits incurred by the College • Implementing an existing plan to create separate governing boards for each of the campuses • Creating a new board committee to directly address the needs of each campus • Initiating an ambitious fundraising campaign to raise an additional $100 million for the College and assist the other Antioch campuses in their fund raising efforts.
“We are deeply disappointed that the trustees did not take advantage of this historic opportunity,” said Lee Morgan, a director of the ACCC. “Under this agreement, the University would have gained a number of experienced trustees who bring tremendous resources - not just finances, but expertise and energy - on behalf of the entire University.”
Morgan, a Yellow Springs business owner, is the grandson of Arthur Morgan, the college’s 1920s-era president who pulled the college out of near-bankruptcy in the 1920s and introduced the world to the concept of cooperative education. Arthur Morgan also saved Dayton from future flooding after the 1913 flood. As head of the Miami Conservancy District, Arthur Morgan developed the flood-control dam system on the Great Miami River.
Lee Morgan had volunteered to work half-time - for no charge - to raise money for the College beginning in June.
A first round of negotiations broke down March 28. In a tentative deal, the university agreed to a purchase price of $12.2 million for the college and the ACCC would take legal control. Trustees then rejected the offer because it needed the entire $12.2 million up front at closing to keep its creditors satisfied, it said. The ACCC had offered half the amount at closing and payment of the rest over a 5-year period.
The ACCC had been negotiating with university officials since December to buy the college to make it an independent institution. Negotiations took on a sense of urgency in late February, when the university trustees reaffirmed their June 2007 decision to close Antioch College for a year starting this June, after initial negotiations with the ACCC did not produce an agreement.
More later on the details of the negotiations. There’s a three-page timeline of the negotiation details I have to slog through.
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