Mathurian shenanigans

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You're a lying sack of crap
You're a lying sack of crap
You're a lying, stinking, mean and nasty,
Sack of liquid crap

—Beloved ditty from the Stephanie Miller Show

The SOCCCD isn’t known for openness, that's for sure. Remember the board's “persistent and defiant” violations of the state’s “open meetings” law? (See The board of secrecy & Wendy on "closing doors".)

Secrecywise, things have improved since those days, especially at the colleges. But at the district, a lack of openness persists.

Today, the locus of duplicity and connivery is the Chancellor, Raghu P. Mathur.

THE BOARD AGENDA:

Arguably, the most important district decision-making occasions are the monthly board meetings, to which the public is invited. Indeed, Board (BOT) meetings are televised.

According to state law, all topics to be discussed at a board meeting, whether in closed or open session, must be listed and briefly described, and that document—the agenda—must be made available beforehand.

The problem with the required "agenda" is that it is actually only an outline. Further, at the SOCCCD, Mathur composes the agenda. And the fellow is quite capable of engaging in deception most foul.

Remember this board agenda item? Item 38 for the October 30, 2006, board meeting was the following:

(See Raghu's stealth agenda item.) In fact, the highlighted element was a large raise for Mathur, who, as the district's chief administrator, is certainly not among "academic personnel," i.e., faculty.

Now, how was anyone who read the agenda supposed to know that the board was scheduled to decide on an item which, if approved, would give the Chancellor a big, fat raise?

THE DOCKET MEETING:

By law, the public must have access to this agenda outline by 72 hours prior to the meeting. But that isn't much lead time.

Having adequate lead time is particularly important for "governance groups," such as the two Academic Senates (faculty), for, naturally, often, they have a great stake in what is decided. And, like everyone else, they sometimes need time to prepare for "providing input" to the almighty BOT.

Years ago, governance groups routinely participated in “docket” meetings. Those are meetings, held well in advance of board meetings, in which agenda items for the coming board meeting are previewed.

When Mathur became Chancellor, he informed the governance groups that they would no longer be invited to docket meetings.

The Academic Senates cried foul, but to no avail.

Eventually, however, owing to pressures from the Accreds, the Academic Senates and other governance groups were again allowed to attend "docket." Whew!

THE "FULL" AGENDA:

What one really needs in order to be prepared for board meetings isn't the agenda outline, but the so-called "full agenda" ("agenda packet"), which is sometimes hundreds of pages long. It includes much detail and relevant documentation. It's the "packet" that the trustees receive about three days prior to each meeting.

To date, the public is not provided access to the full agenda or packet. (Go to the district website and see.)

JUST GO TO MYSITE!

Theoretically, governance groups, including faculty, have access to the full agenda, for, we’re told, we can simply download it from Mysite! (The public, of course, has no access to Mysite, unless they happen to be IVC or Saddleback students.)

Do this: log on to Mysite; go to my work, then employee services, then documents. Then scroll down to “board agendas” and click the desired agenda.

Last Monday, before the board meeting, I did all that. It didn’t work. I clicked and got nothing.

I asked two colleagues to try downloading the packet with their computers. They, too, got nothing.

Oddly, today—four days after the meeting—I do seem able to download June's "full agenda" from Mysite.

PLANS B:

The Raghu P. Mathur playbook includes many clever ploys to keep "opponents" at a disadvantage. In Raghu World, it is particularly important to keep those nasty old "shared governance groups" in the dark about controversial board meeting discussion/action items. Gotta catch 'em off guard!

The "exclusion from docket" gambit was great, but it didn't last. Mathur had to turn to plan B.

Plan B involves sneaking things onto the full agenda, which is discussed at docket, only after docket. That's just what Mathur tried back in October in order to get his COLA, which had come before the trustees before but had been tabled or defeated. It wasn't until just before the actual board meeting in October that the following item mysteriously appeared in the full agenda (under item 38):

How odd that Mathur would suddenly spell out his unfamiliar first name like that! Gosh, a person reading the item might not guess it concerns the Chancellor at all!

Unfortunately for Mathur, his ploy was detected by a faculty member and possibly by some trustees (he was attempting to pull the wool over trustee eyes, too). He paid the price of brief embarrassment.

I remember looking up at the dais and seeing faces that growled: "Why, you lying, scheming, grasping, insufferable sack of crap."

I could be wrong.

A month later, Mathur got his raise. He now makes about $300,000 a year.

I guess the board doesn't mind a little chicanery.

PLAN C:

This brings me, at long last, to plan C. Plan C isn't so much a way to keep opponents in the dark, though it is indeed a way to keep 'em off balance. —Or maybe just broke!

It works like this. Sometimes, Mathur doesn't sneak something onto the agenda; rather, he sneaks something off! That is, he removes items that have already been previewed at docket—without informing anyone.

For instance, until last Monday, as far as anyone knew, Mathur had agendized approval of some summer stipends for Monday's board meeting. Included was approval of stipends for work that had already been done by officers of the IVC Academic Senate. So approval was important. People, even senate presidents, should be paid for their work!

Mathur suddenly had "questions." So, at the last minute, he quietly pulled the item.

As a result, those faculty will now go yet another month without compensation!

THIS WEEK'S DISSENT PUZZLER:

Who said:

P.S. (4:55):

See comments. We have a winner.

His/her prize?

A valuable coupon for the purchase of Rain bird irrigation and personal lubrication products.