Mississippi voters are being asked to consider a referendum on today’s ballot that would change the term limits of members of the board of trustees for the state’s Institutions of Higher Learning.
The referendum also proposes to alter the selection process for the board of trustees, commonly referred to as the College Board.
Pamela Smith, the assistant commissioner for public affairs and development for the institution, said the referendum hopes to accomplish two things.
“(The referendum) changes the way board members serve a certain number of years,” Smith said. “And it changes how the board members are selected.”
Smith said that currently members of the board serve a term of 12 years. The proposed amendment would change the term limits to nine years.
The official IHL Web site states that the governor is the one who appoints the members to the board, after the state senate approves the nomination.
Stephen Shaffer, an professor in the political science department at Mississippi State University, said this referendum has the College Board divided. Potentially, by changing the term limits of the members, one governor serving a second term could appoint all the members to the board.
“The College Board was set up to avoid what happened in the Great Depression because of Gov. Bilbo,” Shaffer said.
In his book, Mississippian: Mississippi Government and Politics: Modernizers versus Traditionalists, Shaffer states that then-Gov. Bilbo took control over the board and instituted the discharge of 179 faculty and staff members that had opposed him. As a result of this, college accrediting agencies suspended several of the institutions until the next state governor reformed the board, setting up term limits for its members.
Smith said that the state’s constitution had set up the 12-year term limits in an effort to minimize politicization during the process and not allow one governor to gain influence over the entire board.
“The real problem here is not of gubernatorial control, but of consistency in long term planning for our state university system,” said Roy Klumb, the vice president to the board, in a letter to the editor.
Klumb wrote that in his seven years on the board he has seen three different presidents at colleges such as MSU, Delta State University and the University of Southern Mississippi.
“With this kind of turnover and the ultimate changes in ideas and style, stability must come from somewhere, and that stability exists with your lay Board members,” Klumb said.
Smith also said that presently the state uses an outdated congressional districting method in choosing the representatives from each region. The proposed change would utilize Supreme Court districts in deciding representation.
The IHL Web site says that currently the state chooses seven of the board members from the congressional districts that existed in 1944. In addition, three other members come from the state’s three Supreme Court districts and two more members are appointed from the state at-large.