I’m Mike Sanderson. I last spoke at the foundation meeting on July 11 on this Alligator Accreditor, and I'd like to pick up right where I left off on this, the mystery of the $4 million dollars.
Since then, investigative journalist Jason Garcia has confirmed the $4 million was not listed in the 500-plus-page budget, and that “It only briefly surfaced in a few obscure appropriations records, under a line item that was so vague — “implementation expense” — it was meaningless.”
Jason knows Tallahassee better than I do, but I did check with legislative staff, and the legislature can make allocations so vague they are essentially discretionary.
I want to ask if it’s really possible this $4 million was always intended to create a new accreditor, though I think the intent is a red herring. You have a serious problem with this $4 million regardless ` the intent, and I have a distinct legal issue if I have time.
First, is a new accreditor actually implementing existing legislation? Because the law requires Florida universities to change accreditors repeatedly. So we’re creating a new accreditor that universities will be required to change away from? Your deliverables opening by claiming the legislature allocated $4 million to create this absurd situation.
Second, there’s no evidence. The chancellor spoke to Garcia, "Rodrigues said Renner agreed to give $4 million to the Board of Governors that the agency could quickly tap into if a Republican were to win the 2024 presidential election.” I don’t think that’s true, because you did not act quickly. You met in Jacksonville on January 30, and no one mentioned it. We heard nothing until just after the end of the fiscal year.
I don’t think this secret plan existed because I don’t think it matters if this secret plan existed. The $4 million was real.
The first reason it doesn’t matter is that the Chancellor didn’t tell you about it. Either you had $4 million to create a new accreditor that the chancellor didn't tell you for about 16 months, or you had $4 million in discretionary funds the chancellor didn't tell you about for 16 months.
This isn’t on Renner, who I assume would expect the Board’s liaison to the legislature to keep the Board informed of $4 million.
Second reason, the money was allocated to the Board.
Realistically the Board can honor a private arrangement between the Speaker of the House and the Board’s liaison. But the money was allocated to the Board, so you have to do that. The money was really discretionary, and if there wasn’t actually firm intent and the Board had $4 million in discretionary funds the Chancellor didn’t tell you about until after he decided how to spend them.
Finally, I made a records request for communications regarding this, and I received 17 individuals emails, one for each board member, asking to have a 1-1 conversation with the Chancellor.
To quote from the Sunshine Law Manual, Page 10:
While normally meetings between the school superintendent and an individual school board member would not be subject to s. 286.011, F.S., these meetings were held in “rapid--fire succession” in order to avoid a public airing of a controversial redistricting problem. Thus, even though the superintendent was “adamant that he did not act as a go-between during these discussions and [denied] that he told any one board member the opinions of the others,” the one- to-one meetings amounted to a de facto meeting of the school board in violation of s. 286.011, F.S.
See also Transparency for Florida, Inc. v. City of Port St. Lucie, 240 So. 3d 780 (4th DCA 2018) (evidence did not “conclusively refute” allegations that a series of telephone calls between the city attorney and individual city councilmembers to discuss termination of and severance pay to, the city manager constituted a Sunshine Law violation; accordingly, trial court should not have entered summary judgment in favor of the city).
Im not going to be the plaintiff on this. It’s possible no one actually will step forward, which would be incredible considering the amount of support.
In the end, you're asking other states to sign on to this Alligator Accreditor, and this is how you're going about it. If it turns into a fiasco, the Chairs of the committees won’t be able to say they weren’t involved in the decision. Because doing nothing is being involved.
Get your Alligator Accreditor merch at mikesand.printify.me!
