8
War on Many Fronts
It is not possible to really explain the crisis we faced in 2011 without noting that it was coming on multiple fronts. In addition to union busting, the conservatives in the legislature launched destructive initiatives in two other areas: voting rights and privatization of higher education. Not surprisingly, they were helped in these efforts by ALEC, the conservative legislative bill mill.1
One strategy introduced was to turn Ohio’s universities into “charter” institutions by weakening their bonds to state oversight and state funding, in return for more autonomy. Throughout the struggle on this issue, we were baffled as to why—given the demonstrated failure of charter schools in elementary and secondary education—lawmakers would want to undermine our public universities as well.
The first word that we had about charter universities came to us with a thunderclap in an excellent piece in The Cincinnati Enquirer on February 24, 2011. “Ohio Gov. John Kasich is promoting a plan for ‘charter universities’ that would exempt colleges from multiple state regulations as long as they meet certain conditions, while continuing to receive taxpayer money,” the Enquirer reported. The newspaper had talked to David Creamer, vice president for finance and business services at Miami University, who told them that Kasich had not yet formally proposed the restructuring plan. But he said that relief from regulatory burdens would help colleges control costs. “In trying to make sure things don’t get mishandled, we create a lot of red tape,” he said. “That’s a decision every institution would have to make, whether the tradeoffs are worth it.”2
But the best part came from a letter, obtained by the Enquirer, that UC President Gregory Williams had written to Kasich. In the letter to Kasich, Williams listed several other areas where “charter universities” could be relieved of administrative burdens, including civil service, purchasing, state budget regulations, and “collective bargaining.” Williams also asked Kasich to consider further reforms, including allowing universities to self-insure or purchase their own workers’ compensation insurance; allowing universities to directly acquire land through eminent domain; limiting required responses to public records requests; and reducing reports to the Board of Regents.
To be fair to Williams, we subsequently learned that these were not exactly his personal requests. But perhaps even worse was that all of the state’s university presidents, acting together through the Inter-University Council and its Kasich-appointed director Bruce Johnson, had put together this laundry list of issues, including their desire to undermine their faculty unions. The letter was evidence that Williams was, to a great extent, joining with the other presidents on the Inter-University Council in this attack on the faculty.
Each of these issues individually is controversial and bad policy. The desire, for example, to allow universities t