Then Allen Langley (No longer a Board member) was asked to provide a status report on the various outstanding allegations to be investigated by a third party investigator.
The report basically was that the Board would need to approve $1,787 for a third party investigator and $850 for lie detector tests for President Thornburg and Exec VP Shannon Kennedy. (Outside the meeting discussions indicated these lie detector tests were intended to verify whether or not Thornburg and Kennedy had had an affair.)
Editor’s Note: Most would say any government agency is in deep do-do when they have to administer lie detector testing to their two top managers. I am sure this will be explored in other articles.
Then the agenda called for a closed meeting.
Editor’s Note: NC law has very strict requirements on what is allowed to be discussed behind closed doors. The law also requires that the motion that must be made to go into closed session is very specific about the purpose of the closed session.
Rev. Dr. Lamont Littlejohn made the motion to go into closed session, which was seconded and passed unanimously. However, that motion appears to be illegal in accordance with North Carolina law, which could make everything agreed upon in the closed session and voted on afterward null and void. This CCC Board of Trustees doesn’t seem to get it that NC Law has to be strictly followed in the process and administration of what this board does. Read on, there is much more.
The Board goes into closed session in the original Board room where this meeting started. The meeting included the CCC Board of Trustees, their two lawyers and then Thornburg and his lawyer, Bob Yelton.
This closed session orders pizza around 7:30 PM and comes out of closed session around 9:00 PM. Seven hours in closed session plus two hours for the regular meeting equals nine hours total. This is probably a record in the history of CCC BOT meetings.
Of course nobody waited seven hours for the closed session. Especially the Star whose reporters were not there to cover the meeting in the first place. But the CCC Board of Trustees issues a press release to the Star which basically the Board had come out of the closed session and had agreed to give Thornburg $150,000 plus around another $50,000 for time due by July 31, 2017. Thornburg’s last official day on the books would be that July 31, 2017 date. Thornburg would agree not to make any more claims against CCC. By the time the vote was taken, Board member Bill Turpish had left the meeting. Wes Westmoreland abstained from voting, Wayne King, Jason Falls and Sheriff Alan Norman voted against giving $200,000 (or anything) to Thornburg and Board members June Yarboro, Chris Turner, Larry Hamrick, Lamont Littlejohn (all the CCS school board appointments) plus Gordon Hamrick, Plus new Board members Betty Carrigan and Michael Cheng voted for giving Thornburg that $200,000.
Editor’s Note: The $150,000 that will be given to Thornburg is allegedly going to be misappropriated from county funded allotted to CCC for roof repairs. The whole CCC Board of Trustees have apparently joined in with certain CCC administration people in the misappropriation of money. A criminal enterprise. So, what can we expect not from this crowd in the future. As for Thornburg, his paid time off began early as he left out last week on FMLA paid leave and will not come back to CCC. I would say that Thornburg certainly has more love for money coming into his pocket than the best interest of CCC or any of the students.
Then the CCC Board of Trustees took one more illegal action before they adjourned. They decided to hold a meeting at 7:00 PM July 17, 2017 to interview an interim president brought forward by the personnel committee. I would recommend the “good” board members demand a thorough search with many candidates. I recommend this for one specific reason. With Thornburg gone, this crowd may say all the problems are solved and Shannon Kennedy is the next President of the Cleveland Community College. Some might laugh at that suggestion, but I would bet that thought (and goal) is raging through the minds of the high level bureaucracy at CCC.
Also note that sources indicate Dr. Shannon Kennedy is scheduled, in the very near future to represent, CCC at a meeting of Presidents of NC Community Colleges.
The meeting was adjourned.