COMMENTARY
PRO: 'Yes' vote removes politics from selection process for UH regents
By Frank Boas
This constitutional amendment represents a nonpartisan effort strongly supported by the University of Hawai'i faculty and student organizations to create a nonpartisan merit-based system to select candidates for the UH Board of Regents. This nonpartisan merit-based system has been recommended to the Legislature, as well as to the Board of Regents and the governor, by the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges as representing best practices and will replace the existing regent selection system, which is obsolete and no longer appropriate for the UH system.
The advisory council envisaged in the constitutional amendment will have five important tasks:
This process, which is open and nonpartisan, is designed to eliminate the elements of political patronage as well as the consideration of campaign contributions that have plagued the regent selection system in the past.
The advisory council will consist of seven members appointed respectively by the governor, the president of the state Senate, the speaker of the state House, as well as by organizations representing the faculty, students, alumni and former regents.
The present system of regent selection is no longer appropriate for the present status of the university, which was granted autonomy by a constitutional amendment in 2000. The current system is simply not working. This governor has had four nominees rejected by the Senate and one nominee was withdrawn. The selection process has become a political football between the governor and the Legislature and needs to be fixed.
The present Board of Regents was responsible for mishandling the separation of former President Evan Dobelle, which cost taxpayers more than $2 million — money that would have been better spent on faculty salaries and student scholarships. The board was also criticized by one of the accrediting agencies for allowing "excessive politics" to creep into its meetings as well as micromanagement of the university, thereby risking its accreditation.
The choice for the voters of Hawai'i is clear: Do they want to maintain the status quo of the obsolete and politicized regent selection system that is supported only by the Board of Regents? Or do they want an open nonpartisan merit-based system that is supported not only by the vast majority of the Legislature on a nonpartisan basis, but also by representatives of the UH faculty and students, as well as the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges, all of whom testified in favor of the amendment?
Voters, vote "yes" on Consti-tutional Amendment No. 1.
Frank Boas is a retired attorney and a member of the board of the University of Hawai'i Foundation. He wrote this commentary for The Advertiser.
